A few years ago I decided to make our backyard be a little more nature friendly. We don’t use any chemicals, we’ve put up bird houses, and I created a branch pile in an out of the way spot for critters to call home. I have also kept a pile of scrapwood by our back porch that was more for my own laziness than for the critters, but Spikey and his friends love to hang out there. Unfortunately, this woodpile is pretty ugly and we’ve also been concerned about climbing kids causing a collapse that could injure one of our snake friends.

While working on our porch extension I decided to make a safer house for the snake. The end result is not very pretty, but it provides a safe habitat for the snakes. Next summer we plan on doing some landscaping and at that time I will revisit the snake house and make something more pleasing to the eyes.

For now this is what we have. The top pile is the snake house, the bottom is one of our unsafe wood piles (now removed). The design is simple. I simply stacked my scrapwood making sure to create openings for snakes to hang out and put a few screws into each piece. The top I covered completely to keep rain out, but there are multiple entrances from the sides and bottom.

Pencil was the first snake to come back and check things out. He slithered right over to Ethan and then went looking for an entrance into their mansion. He didn’t at first and left, but Ben and I saw him return later and find his way inside. I was surprised by how big the fork in his tongue is. He looks big in this picture, but Pencil is no fatter than my pinky

While taking apart the pile we also found a new snake, a beautiful baby eastern milk snake. These look like something dangerous at first, but that is by design. Their pattern is similar to a copperhead, but the coloring much different. We’ve seen these around the backyard a few times (and once in the garage), but this is the one was the smallest we’ve seen. Ethan named this snake Spotty and he was about 12 inches long and as skinny as a pencil.

Of course Spikey was hanging around too. He wanted nothing to do with all the commotion so he hung out pool side. Spikey is getting pretty fat. Not sure if he’s finding a lot to eat or if Spikey is really a she.

Here’s a bottom view of the snake house. I left lots of space on the bottom level to help the pile dry out after rain. You can see how the second story has a gap in the middle. Each level has gaps like this so snake can find places to hide.

Ethan also found a snake skin. We could also see that Spikey’s eyes were getting clouded. This is a sign that he is getting ready to shed. No matter how friendly your backyard snake friends are, give them their space when they are preparing to shed. The loosening skin acts like a cataract and they can’t see very well. This makes them shy and defensive.

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