Courage of the Dachshund

With the arrival of our dachshund puppy about 10 days ago, I've taken to regailing everyone available with stories about dachshunds from my childhood. My wife and daughter are totally exasperated with me telling this one particular story so much, so I thought I should immortalize it by putting it on the Internet.

When I was around 8 years old or so, I was playing in the driveway at my parent's house in Westover, Alabama. I heard a rattling noise and looked up to see a large rattlesnake about 6 feet or so from me, coiled up and looking pretty angry and scary.

I immediately started screaming for my Mom, but she was inside the house and didn't hear me. Our two full sized dachshunds Heidi and Lady, however, heard me and came out of the carport to investigate. They immediately started harassing the snake as it started striking at them they went into a sort of frenzy and ended up tearing the snake to bits. Unless it's been badly abused at some point, a dachshund is almost without fear and very protective of their family.