On the road...

Literally, on the road this morning---- one exquisitely squished armadillo and one very long curled-up and pancake-squashed brown snake.  And those two dead creatures were on the road which runs through our hills here, before reaching the main highway.  On the way into town this morning, there were also assorted mashed piles of flesh, bone, and fur, but they were so torn up and eaten up that I wouldn't have been able to identify them even if I had been up close (which is not an option for me).

On the drive back from town, the pile of snake was gone, probably carried off by the vultures. Very easy for them to just pick up a flattened snake and whisk it away into the woods so they can eat in the shade of the trees and not have to scatter every time a car approaches their dining place. That particular snake wasn't as big and heavy as some of the dead snakes I've seen on that road. The heavier the snake, the more of it the vultures have to consume before they're able to transfer it from paved road to grass-coated earth.

As for the armadillo.... when I was driving towards town, the armadillo was face-first into the road, his four little paws flattened out as if he'd run himself into a glass door.  When I came back from town, the armadillo was turned completely over, with his paws nearly reaching for the sky and his dead eyes not seeing that his underside had been ripped apart by the vultures.  Seven vultures had to scatter as I drove down that road towards my house, and I saw in my rear-view mirror that they went right back to their feast as soon as the tail lights of my car were ten inches away from that poor armadillo.

And so concludes today's wildlife/roadkill adventure. I tried to just state the facts, without adding any unnecessary complaints about the disgusting and nerve-numbing emotional trauma that goes hand-in-hand with getting into one's car and driving into town for a few hours.

Give me a blessed break.