In the summer of '98, when Kazbek was only six months old, two days of dog vs. rattlesnake encounters followed, one upon the other. Here is that story.
Rattlesnake: Day 1:
The big Caucasian pup was meandering about the yard when he suddenly alerted, and ran to a shed at the back of the property. Near the shed, his whole body stiffened, and he began to bark in a reverberating tone I had never head before. In reply, a loud and angry buzzing emerged from the shallow black hole beneath the shed's foundation. Rattlesnake!
Our unwanted visitor, though dangerous where he lay, could not be rousted in the dark. So I rounded up all the dogs, locking them indoors for the night, and praised Kazbek heartily for his cleverness. Indeed, only Kaz, of all the dogs in the yard that evening, had sensed the hidden reptile, and it was only Kazbek's immediate and aggressive alarm that had forced the creature to make its presence known. One thing about rattlesnakes: like all wild creatures, they have a territory. While one might deter a rattler with an unpleasant-to-it encounter (such as hearing the dog bark and feeling the vibrations of the dog's pounding feet), the snakes are guaranteed to eventually return. On the property in question, we had an ancient barn which housed mice and rats, lizards, and birds, and we were surrounded on the outer perimeter (outside the fence) by a ground squirrel infestation.
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| Rattlesnakes from the yard in the desert circa 2000 |
Rattlesnake: Day 2:
After Kazbek's first encounter with an unseen (but definitely heard) rattler under the storage shed last night...in fact, exactly 24 hours later...we had another exciting evening with reptilian wildlife. It was twilight. My sister had just gotten home from work, and day was rapidly fading. When the dogs in the yard began yapping, we couldn't see anything through the screen door.
Kaz suddenly added his heavy baying bark to the commotion of the pack that was currently in the yard. He followed up his barks by body-slamming the closed kitchen screen door. I then squeezed opened the door to see what was going on, and was greeted with the threatening HISSSSS, sounding like a broken gas main. In the desert, that sound means but one thing: an angry rattlesnake.
I slammed the heavy, security screen that stood between the rattler on the doorstep and the yellow light of our little kitchen where I, my sister, and a livid Kazbek, peered out. To my horror, as we looked out, our little white Akbash-Lab mix rescue, Lily, emboldened by what she assumed was her humans joining the assault, rushed forward to pitch battle with the very large, very dark, rattler that had settled itself on the welcome mat. I shouted for her back to back off. Fortunately, she recognized the distress in my voice, and moved away, still barking. (Later that year, Lily was bitten by a different rattler, same yard, because while she wanted to defend her yard (good girl!) she did not have the native savvy to do it as Kazbek did.)
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| Our Lily |
We called Emergency-911 and firemen were dispatched to our address immediately. In the meanwhile, three other dogs - loose, anxious and barking - were stranded in the yard. In response to their plight, my sister jumped out the kitchen window - still in her business suit and heels - and hurried round the house to a separate entrance where, with some difficulty, she cajoled the loose dogs into the barn.
Meanwhile, Kazbek's constant threat roar kept the snake coiled on the porch, ready to strike; when threatened, rattlers coil, thus, it was unable to slither into the night from whence it surely would have returned to the yard the next day.
After what seemed like an hour - but was only minutes - the firemen arrived to dispatch the snake, which measured more than three feet in length and thick as a woman's arm.
We thanked the firemen; but Kaz got the biggest portion of praise. Not only had he recognized and dealt appropriately with the threat posed by the rattler, but he was also courageous in his response and full of fortitude: Kazbek did not quit his threat to the rattler until all danger was gone. His primitive instincts gave him a sense of the spatial range from which to keep his body in front of us while also giving threat to the snake. The screen door had no meaning to his dog's mind; therefore, in his defense reaction, he had looked within for instinct and courage, and was not found wanting.
At last, with the snake dispatched and firemen gone, all was quiet on the western front. Now it was time to retrieve the sequestered dogs from the barn. I grabbed a flashlight and, nervous as a 10-cup a day coffee drinker, cautiously stepped into the backyard. In and out of the shadows, my weak flashlight (the kind that horror movie virgins always use to check out suspicious noises) was proving useless. After all the excitement, my nerves were shot, so - unlike the horror movie virgin! - I turned back to get some company, the Kaz. As we neared the barn, Kazbek began to bark thunderously. There was something about that bark that frightened me, and I froze. Then I shone the light ahead and in its beam, saw Kazbek leap straight into the air like a cat. And - HISSSS - he had found another rattler! Invisible in the gloom, the snake had apparently curled up right in front of the dog kennels - exactly where I was heading in my unwisely chosen, open-toed flip-flops. I shouted for Kaz, he came, and we ran together back to the house.
Soon Emergency-911 dispatched another fire truck. While waiting for the firemen, I grabbed a better light and went back to scout the area where Kaz had spotted the snake; however, in the short time it took to use the phone, the rattler had already escaped. Trusting completely now in Kaz' 6th (and other) senses, I brought him to the spot where the latest rattler had lain, and gave him the familiar cue, "find it." The young CO put his nose to earth and began tracking a line from the barn to the fence. He was resolute in his task but also jumpy as a cat on a hot tin roof. Underneath the fence, the trail disappeared. Still engaged, Kaz was sniffing up and down the length of the fence, and I felt certain the snake must have escaped that way.
When the firemen arrived, I dared not confess that only my DOG had seen the last rattler (I had only heard it), and that the six month old puppy had then "tracked" the snake along the fence-line. Therefore, I simply stated that the rattler had slipped through the fence, and then showed them the route of escape Kazbek had actually indicated to me. The firemen searched inside the yard carefully, finding nothing. Another group went outside the fence to take a look and within moments, near the outer fence perimeter, they found the second rattlesnake - and then a third - exactly where Kaz had indicated. One was a two-footer; the other was small, a dangerous baby rattler. Unfortunately, these two reptiles were compelled to join the first in snake heaven that night.
All in all, a busy night for a six-month old Caucasian Ovcharka!
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| "Kazbek and the Moon" |
