I never thought I would love reading about snakes! Your take on the subject is so real and true; When I moved to my beautiful mega-house ten years ago in a town called Rocklin, California, I was introduced to a baby rattlesnake in the garden. Fear got the best of me, and I killed it without any shame. I have never intentionally killed or sacrificed any animal in my life. My late mother, a Muslim woman, was so opposed to killing or sacrificing any animal that she forbid everyone around her to take in any part of such actions, I grew up with that mentality in a country where Muslims love to sacrifice animals for just about any occasion they can think of to celebrate. So I felt terrible in the later weeks. Then I was faced with another snake on my paved, stained front yard with slip-guard protection for cars. This time I consulted Wikipedia and matched the poor snake to a mare garden snake. It was so afraid of me that it curled up and hid his head in fear. The little thing was no more than half a foot long. I couldn't bring myself to my nine-iron! I decided to use my pool's leaf scooping thingy to scoop up the snake and walked nearly a quarter-mile to a tiny creek inside a government-declared protected wild-life preserve near the golf course surrounding my home. I let it go. I felt so good. I never killed another because I never looked for one again.