As I was walking into work this morning, in the turnstile at the security entrance, I saw a thick, generally black, young snake (about 18-24 inches long). That surprised me, as it was actually by the turnstiles as I made it into the short breezeway into the Piper Aircraft campus.
It may have been the harmless and endangered Eastern Indigo Snake (link). However, its body was very thick, as I mentioned, and the tail seemed far more abrupt than photos of the Indigo suggest. So, I am not fully convinced yet. Since it was thick-bodied, and that makes me think of rattlers and cottonmouths (though I felt sure it was not one of those two species) I tended toward caution with it. I didn't want to be an idiot and pick it up to move it to some shrubs.
The company guard stepped out as I got his attention. After pointing it out I asked him if he had something to move it with. I didn't want the creature to wander onto the campus, after all -- not really a good place for a snake, all concrete and tar, really. Also, I was pretty sure some folks might have a much bigger issue with confronting a snake than I did. The guard gave me a broom to brush him out of the gateway. It made its way into the shrubs out front, the rule that they are more frightened of us than we need to be of them proving true yet again.
A coworker sent me this link, below, to look up Florida snake varieties (which I used to find the Indigo page link above). He found the site handy when building his house in Sebastian, he said. He came across many different types of snakes. I found images of the Indigo, and while it could be one, that would depend on what variations in body shape there are for the different age groups of the species.
If I figure out, or someone tells me, exactly what it was, I'll be following up on it.
- Jon O
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