Diamond - the ringed python, my rainbow serpent 2000-2004

This is Diamond, a ringed python. The picture does not do her justice. She had the most incredibly beautiful rainbow iridescence. Diamond was one of my favorite snakes in our small collection. She was very friendly, intelligent, and curious. She always had to investigate everything. Here she is, stretching forward to check out the camera. In the evenings, she would stretch up to the top of her cage to ask to be let out. Then, when I opened the cage she would wait for me to stick my hand in the cage and climb up onto my hand to be lifted out. Diamond was also very feisty and always let you know what she did and didn't like or want.

Earlier this winter, Diamond managed to somehow squeeze herself out of the locked sliding screen top of the cage we had kept her in for all of her four years. We turned the house inside out looking for her. We had just moved into a Philadelphia row house. Recently, our nextdoor neighbor told me he found her underneath the floor of his house, frozen to death, when he had the floor taken up to do some renovations. Up to that point, we were still holding out hope she would come out of hiding to look for food, or we would find her some place we had missed looking.

Diamond is very sorely missed. She was a beautiful and fascinating creature that I feel privileged to have had in my life. For all of the uninitiated who ask if snakes have a personality, I wish they could have met her.

Goodbye Diamond. I will meet you, my Diamond girl, my rainbow serpent, on the other side of the rainbow bridge.