Today was a beautiful day. The weather was cold and the sun was shining bright. I went out for a walk and on one of my favourite paths I found a huge Moor Frog. It looked at me and it was just stunningly beautiful. I looked at it for a moment and then It jumped of the path and down into a brook. However, living animals wasn’t the only thing I saw during my walk. I also saw a lot of dead animals. Someone in my neighbourhood must be a true snake-hater because I always find snakes with their heads squashed. They come up on the road to sunbath and instead they get their heads smashed in. Sometimes it’s adders but most often it’s Slow-worms. Who would kill a slow-worm? They’re beautiful, their faces looks like a dinosaurs’ and they’re pretty much the definition of harmless. They can do nothing. Literary nothing, that can ever harm you. Why would you kill something that is lying on the ground defenceless? What is the point?
Moor frog photographed by Lars Bergendorf
The worst part is that I am the youngest person in this neighbourhood. If I found out it was a kid I would give them a lecture and be over with it but there are no kids around. Whoever is doing this must be at least 30 or older. And it’s not a small amount of dead snakes I’m talking about. I haven’t counted them but I have found at least one new every day during this summer. I now what the problem is but I don’t understand it. The problem is that certain animals are considered “disgusting”. Snakes, snails, worms and frogs are some of those. My cousin once smashes a toad under her shoe. The same cousin that always keeps angry lectures about people hitting their dogs.
Whenever I speak up for those animals I always hear things like; “but they’re only snails” or “they’re disgusting”. Apparently things are only worth caring about if they’re beautiful. Idiocy is a short term for that kind of thinking.
Slow-worm, or copper-snake as we call them where I come from.
Count on the Birds 