Last week, G and I hosted a small dinner party and it was lovely — no notes. Except we kept all the windows open, including the ones without screens, and by the time everyone left there were 1,000 fruit flies to every remaining human. 

This edition isn’t about fruit flies (ramekins of apple cider vinegar are now all around the house), but it is more of a story than a series of personal solutions. It’s about another evil thing that got into the house because of changing seasons and temperatures — but this one was wriggly evil not tiny evil.

Ok so it’s right after the fourth of July, and G and I have been staying at my parent’s house for the long weekend. Work is quiet, Wimbledon is playing on mute in the living room, I'm emptying the dishwasher or tidying up or something serene. Can’t remember exactly what. But then G comes running out of our bedroom. Screaming.

"Snake." Heavy breathing. "Snake in our room." Pupils dilated. "I saw its little face. Snake snake snake."

Ah the classic prank. A little derivative, no?

Still, I grabbed a broom for protection, and then peered around the door to the guest room. Where sat a large, coiled black snake. With a little face.

I don't know the last time you saw a snake up close. If ever, I hope it was somewhere far out in the woods where you could easily sprint back down the trail and lock yourself in your car. But when you see one next to your pillow, I can assure you of a few things:

Being the cowards that G and I are, we waited paralyzed, watching the snake sit and slide around the room, until my parents got back from a dog walk. (For the record, we’re in our thirties.) I considered calling the police?

At last, my parents got back to save us from our whimpering. Dad put the dog in the mudroom, and then walked into our room with a fire prodder in hand. Leaning down — human face to little snake face with little snake tongue — he scooped the guy out the door, where I stood with the broom, ready to push the snake toward Mom (mop in hand) and the front door, like the world's least relaxing game of shuffleboard.

And out it went. Far far away, hopefully. Perhaps toward you in your car.

Who is the hero, the villain, and the fool of this tale?

Hero: Mom, Dad, possibly G for discovering the snake and sending out the bat signal. Definitely the fire prodder.

Villain: the snake and/or see below …

Fool: me, the idiot who left the front door open earlier that morning when packing the car. 

The math is roughly: Hot outside → snake wanted less hot → open door → the perfect crime. 

Not unlike the fruit fly math: Cold outside → bugs wanted less cold → open windows → bug invasion.

The thing about watching a snake speed-writhe across your floor is that your brain will subsequently see snakes everywhere. Or what you think are snakes.

Snake? → backpack straps

Snake? → bra in the hamper

Snake? → Labrador’s tail

I accept this as my long-term punishment for leaving the front door open.

Rationally, I know with time I will stop assuming every long or dark-colored object is the devil. Right now, though, I’ve been using family members as human shields every time I see a garden hose.

But all this got me thinking, with more and more hot summer days on a warming planet, will there be more snakes in houses? Or more fruit flies? Will I actually be seeing snakes everywhere?

It took me a while to get to the “sustainability” part of this newsletter edition, but here we are. 

I did some digging and it turns out that yes, warming temps will push venomous snakes into other regions like grasslands — while places like rainforests may lose some snakes. This is expected to happen mainly in sub-Saharan Africa and parts of Asia, and the timeline is thankfully fairly long (2070).

According to one scientific study (that I have no idea how to verify), something similar will probably happen to ratsnakes aka black snakes — the heat won’t hurt them, and they’ll probably just start doing more stuff at night when it’s a little cooler.

And that’s all the snake research you get because I’m about to yack from googling snakes. Now as for solutions …

Normally this section is about tactical steps we can pretty easily make to tackle things like food waste, sustainable furniture, or “rewilding” a garden. However, “snake-related climate solutions” is a fairly niche topic. 

You can certainly take preventative measures (close your front door on a hot day, and in the future, also close it at night) but there’s only so many proactive snake mitigation measures out there (unless you’ve got deets on a snake self-defense class at the Y). 

Here’s what I’ve got:

The VA Forestry article where I got those ^ tips also admits that “the only truly effective way to keep snakes out of your yard is to fence the entire area with a solid four- to five-foot fence made of a slick material, buried a foot in the ground.” So you could try that too.

And if you do end up seeing a snake in your house this fall, I recommend calling a local pest control company. Or my dad.