RATTLESNAKE dang near got me!!!!!

[Redneck Toadstomper]

We were working our hosta beds today and getting ready to split them. We have several thousand potted up that are grown stacked tight together. I reached down into them (I'm the reach in man in this type of situation) and pulled up a 4' 5" timber rattler along with several hostas. Never rattled before his first strike at my face and when I dropped him along with the plants he struck again and got his fangs into my pant leg and got hung up a few seconds. Got separated and he came after me. They usually move away if given a chance, and I sure gave him several!!! I decided to capture and measure him. For you P. E. T. A. people the snake was CUT UP, DEEP FRIED, and EATEN TONIGHT AT SUPPER!! Just kidding, he was released on the back side of our farm. (Burrrp) This was one mad snake to say the least!!! I had several scared employees that saw it happen. They thought the snake had hit me in the face and the leg. :--) Didn't get much out of them until we took a break and let 'em gather themselves. Now they understand what I've told 'em a hundred times, Know your surroundings and pay attention to what you're doing!!

 

[M Barnett]

Now that is way too close for comfort! I've come close myself, but not that close. Sad news. In Tucson, a herbatologist or whatever they call a snake doctor has discovered the rattlesnakes venom has made a quick evolution and has become much stronger and more lethal.

Michael

 

[Jeff H]

I'm glad we don't have those things up here. Skunks anyone.

 

[dalton4]

Redneck, I would have killed the snake in a heart beat. It wouldn't have to strike at me ... just be seen on my property or in my general area.



Jerry

 

[LEEH]

REDNECK You were fortunate the snake missed, well almost missed. I have to congratulate you on not giving in to the immediate impulse to destroy the snake. Even though the rattle snakes are a problem to man and beast, they do have a place in the wild and do as much good as harm in rodent control. Out here in the west, it used to be common to see snakes on the highway and off the road. That hasn't been the case for at least 25 years now. Why, I am not sure, but the human fear of snakes (including mine) has to be a factor.

 

[RT66DOC]

"her·pe·tol·o·gy Pronunciation Key (hûrp-tl-j)

n.

The branch of zoology that deals with reptiles and amphibians.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[Greek herpeton, reptile (from herpein, to creep) + -logy. ]

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

herpe·to·logic (-t-ljk) or herpe·to·logi·cal adj.

herpe·to·logi·cal·ly adv.

herpe·tolo·gist n. "



Personally, I hate snakes and would shoot first and ask questions later.

 

[klenger]

Someone would have to jump start my heart, then change my shorts.

 

[jimk]

snake

I would have released a non lethal snake but the rattler would have met his end. Bull snakes and the such are good to have around the farm but what is the rattler bites some one else?

I was working on a track hoe for my father, replacing the swing gear, I had a sheet of 4x8 plywood to lay under the track hoe to lay on and had been on it for a little while. My brother asked if I had checked under the plywood? So I got out from under the track hoe and checked and found 6 copper head snakes under it. A 12 gauge shot gun was used to remove the snakes.

My wife hid removed the 40 cal. from under the pillow for fear of any bad memorys of the snakes, good idea.



JImk

 

[LSMITH]

I went over to a friends house years ago in CO. We sat on the couch and were having a beer, and he kept looking around. After a while it drive me nuts, I asked "what the he!! are you looking for?!?!?!" He said "a snake" so I was thinking water snake. I asked how he got a snake in the house, his dog had been barking and jumping around the steps to the porch, so he looked and there was a 3' rattlesnake. About this time I started to get nervous. He said he cought it and had it in the woodstove till he decided what to do with it, yeah I know, not a bright thing to do. He opened the stove because his girlfriend was seriously mad about a rattlesnake in the house, and was gonna throw it out. Well it struck at him, he jumped back and she left. The snake got out, and went under the couch. He went out to try to get her to stay and lost track of the snake. I came over and there we were!!! Scared the crap out of me. Drinking beer sitting on the back of the couch now looking for a snake, LOL. We would jump across the house to get to the fridge for another beer LOL! We finally saw it, coming out from under the chair. A fireplace poker held it down and he grabbed it behind the head. He was holding it and asked me what to do, I just laughed. It had been a few beers since this started. He put it in the chest freezer, decided he was gonna chill it to slow it's movements so we could examine it. Well, he would open the lid a tad and look, it would strike so he would close it. A few beers more passed, and we forgot about it. We looked later and there it was, coiled ready to strike and frozen solid. Talk about cool!!!! We took it out and sat it on the coffee table, as the frost came off it it's eyes cleared up and it looked 100% alive!! About then the girlfriend rolled up. We were drunk (strike one), and had what appeared to be a live rattler on the table ready to strike at us (strike two) and did not tell her until she was a couple feet from it (strike three). She left again cursing like a sailor, she did not come back for several days. He eventually thawed it and skinned it. All in all it was funny, but extremely dumb.

 

[ZEEEW]

Antivenin sucks

Been bit by a Great Basin rattler, the antivenin was worse for me than the bite. One fang in the right index finger, hand swelled a bit. That snake ended up in the freezer as well for positive ID at hospital. I got bit because I was catching them at the time, not because it just decided to come and bite me.

Yes the venom is changing a bit, becoming a neuro/hemotoxin blend in some species, most rattlers are a hemotoxin.

I still like to photograph them if I fid one, and still will catch and check them out. For the most part they will leave you alone if you leave them alone. If they wanted to bite you for no reason, you would have a fang in you before you see them, instead of "hey there is a snake, kill it before it gets us". Also keep in mind that a dead snake CAN envenomate if you are checking out the fangs.

Snakes do play an important part in nature, but unfortunatly fear of them is proving to take a serious toll on the poor critters.

I have 10 (not rattlers) that live at my place, and I take them to schools and other groups to try to teach people about the roles they play, and snakes in general. Most all the kids will come up and touch, it seems to be the adults that are scared of them. The Burmese about gets mauled, a few kids get in a line and carry him all over. He is around 11' about 50 lbs.



Eric

 

[illflem]

When folks kill rattlers that let off a buzzing warning all they are doing is selectively breeding the ones that don't buzz and most likely never see. I've known probably 5 people who have been bitten, all were trying to pick the snake up. I just leave them be.

 

[wcaldwell]

Two weeks ago, I was at church recording the radio broadcast tape for the following Sunday's program. About 8:15 I called home to let my wife know I would be about 30 more minutes and she said, "A tree has blown over onto the back fence and there's a rattle snake in the back yard. " Since she didn't sound hysterical, I knew she and the dogs were ok, so I told her I would be home in a few minutes, that I only had about 5 more minutes of the pastor's sermon to record. She said "OK. But a tree has blown over onto the back fence and There's A Rattle Snake In The Back Yard!!!!!" This time with a little more emphasis. So I finished the sermon part of the recording and shut down the equipment and went home. It figures that when you are in a kind of a hurry, everyone else in front of you wants to take their sweet time. I got home about 8:40 and a tree was gently on the fence - didn't hurt it any. And my wife had both dogs over by the fallen tree on leashes to keep them away from the snake. The snake was coiled up beside the house between the wall and a cactus. Still laying there - not doing anything. I tried to get it with the garden rake and you could see it's hundreds of little feet trying to run away as fast as it could. I found it again, about 3 feet from where it was initially and got the shovel and rake and tried to get it out - it didn't like that shovel at all. I had my wife push the snake with the handle of the shovel and then pressed I the garden rake on top of it so it couldn't go anywhere else. I tried to hold the rake with one hand and chop off it's head with the shovel but my aim wasn't real good and only hurt it - the snake - a little. I told my wife to get me the square shovel. She brought it to me and I put the blade right behind that shakes head and chopped it off. I threw the head out into the empty field/desert behind the house and then the body. The next day, I went out and found the body and cut off the rattles. They were only about an inch or so long. First rattle snake we've found here in or around our yard.



When we were finished, and cut up the tree, my wife asked me, "when you called and I told you there was a rattle snake in the yard, what part of 'there is a rattle snake in our yard' didn't you understand???

 

[homeka45]

No snakes here, one of the benefits of living in Hawaii. I'd probably be clueless and get bit if I was living on the mainland like you guys.

 

[Todd G]

I've seen a lot of rattlers here in Arizona. Almost all of them will announce their presense from about 20 feet so you can avoid them. The others are sluggish and in shady areas. I remember walking through the desert one time with a friend when he yelled snake. I had stepped over a 4 footer and he didn't make a peep. I said "thank you sir" and let him be. That's the kind of rattler I want in the gene pool

 

[merryman]

Some years ago while deer hunting in Arizona, my brother shot a deer while he was around a fairly small but very steep mountain from me. I saw the deer comming around the mountain, but it promptly went out of sight. I started running around the mountain to get in view and came to a really steep area of broken shale with lots of large boulders. Thinking I could see better from up on the boulders, I started jumping from one to the next-------just as I was commited to one jump, I saw a large rattler coiled right where I was going to land.

I could not avoid the jump, but I was able to change direction a little.

I went rolling and bouncing down that broken shale for a long ways; I might have been better off, and I know my rifle would have been better off had I taken my chances with the snake.



BTW, I have killed and seen a slug of rattlers in Arizona (13 one day near Cave Creek), and in Eastern Oregon, and I have not yet heard one rattle!!!!!!!!

 

[M Barnett]

We have about 15 species of rattlers here in Az. , including the sidewinder. Kill'em all, let the devil sort them out!

Michael

 

[JohnMcIntyre]

First contact....!!

Originally posted by Redneck Toadstomper

Know your surroundings and pay attention to what you're doing!!

Worthy sentiments... . reminds me of an incident that happened to me back on Halloween 1995. I had recently completed my AFF freefall parachute course at California City SkyDive DropZone and after graduating, I was able to do some additional jumps towards my USPA "A" licence and improve my canopy handling and landing skills, before returning to Europe.



Picture this..... coming in on final approach above the California High Desert, 4pm in the afternoon, ambient temperature 70 deg F, little crosswind. Perfect! For those of you who are not skydivers, it was important (as a new skydiver, just off student status) not to focus directly on the ground where I would be touching down on, rather looking some distance beyond this point, to get a much more accurate and slower changing perception, of how much farther I had still left to descend under canopy before touchdown.



At 500 feet I lined up and adjusted my approach to establish a smooth, stand-up landing... . 400 feet ... . 300 feet... 200feet... . 100 feet... . 50 feet ( ground rush increases significantly at this point onwards). I start the canopy flare with just a few feet remaining and and get ready to make my first stand-up landing, without a stumble..... except I made touchdown on the back of a rattler's head, sunbathing in the desert scrub ... . which I determined about 1 second later... . quickly followed by the desert 2-step .



To this day, I still don't know who was more surprised/anxious from this incident, but I've been just a little bit careful since in first contact situations, when visiting a new DropZone.

 

[Rammin On]

Ran into a copperhead Sunday at the campgound ... . a very young girl walking my puppy around around yelled to me ... HEy . . there's a snake over here ..... so I went over to see ... expecting to see a harmless snake ... . all the while the puppy and girl were checking out the snake ... . I told her to get away for the snake ... it's poisonous ... . I cut it's head off ... . no more snake ... they are lucky the snake didn't strike ... was quite nippy Sun morn ... but when I started fooling with it ... it was striking big time at a stick ... . Glad nothing happened

 

[Happy Camper]

Anything that crawls on it belly dies when I see it. I have walked on air a number of times and when you hit the ground again your heart starts beating again. A dirty trick we always pulled was to cut the head off and coil the body by the house steps where my brothers would come out. Effect is the same as a live one. Sometimes my body would get bruised as a result.

 

[Mark_Kendrick]

I crawled out from under the truck a few feeks ago to find a 5'+ rat snake. It was wider than the hood of my truck(it crwaled under a spare on the side of the garage). My wife telling me,"just grab it". I told her she could grab it but I wasn't gonna. It got under the garage before I could catch it.



It obviosly wasn't poisinous. I'd have set it loose away from the house if I could. That explains where the kittens went



I don't like the nonpoisinous type but don't mind them. venomous snakes are targets.