On the right you will see the implement used
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/30024/rattler.jpg)
That's a pair of boots....and maybe a wallet to boot. :)
That's a Big-Un! :o
Wow!
That's one reason I like the North, one less thing we have to be watching out for.
We have enough problems without them!
Seen my share of rattlers in my travels, but never one that big! :o
I know I have posted these before, but, Jeff just loves them.
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/10007/snake%7E1.jpg)
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/10007/snakes1.jpg)
Nice TexasRanger! 8)
what was the snake doing that it had to be killed?
It chased me onto the bed of my truck...at that point I decided to kill it. Gave it to a guy who does trapping around here, hopefully he can use it for something.
Wrong place wrong time evidently .
I got nothing against snakes but if every a poisonous one ever showed up on my property he'd never make it off .I value my grandchildren more than any snake .
Must be some warm down there for the snakes to out and "chasing" people already. I killed one copperhead up at the cabin last year. I feel the same as Al-near the buildings is too close to children and the dogs.
How many rattles? :)
Yeah I agree Al Smith...my dog runs all over my woods....and that rattler no doubt would have done him in.
12 rattles
That's quite a few. Many times, once they get a big bunch of jewelry hanging off their tail, they snag and break off.
I haven't seen that size rattler since I left northern California.
In this part of Montana we have bunches of them, just not that big and I kill every one of them I see. We have cattle, horses, dogs, pets and kids around the ranch and just can't take a chance.
Allan
awsome keep up the good work :) only good snake is a dead snake :)
I kill any poisonous snake I see. I don't like knowing that they are hanging around. But a black snake Ill let go especially if he is away from the house. Felling a tree last summer I looked up to meet a big one coming down the trunk out of a knot hole...Makes your heart skip a beat.
OMG :o I'm glad critters like that don't exist up here 8)
Got a timber rattler that size two years ago. He won't bother my dog ;)
This is why I like where I live. The only natural things that'll try to kill me is the weather.
And we don't have tornados, earthquakes are fairly rare, and I actually like the cold and the snow. I'll stick to the north :snowman:
When my aunt and uncle from east TN come to visit and quail hunt, they dress up like commandos to go in our woods. And I keep the woods pretty clean. Most of the time I only see snakes crawling away from me. This guy decided to turn the tables I guess.
Mercy sakes! big un' that one would have left a mark for sure, we had what was believed to be a pigmy rattler hit my mini schnauser, never saw the snake, just a possibility the vet suggested. small bite pattern with the typical resulting damage effecting the bite area, lost all the hair with the skin turning blackened. It took awhile, but she recovered.
I think the pygmy, along with copper heads, bother me the most, small enough to be unnoticed just laying there.
When I lived in West Milford New Jersey, there was a state park called WayWayYanda State park. The State of New Jersey had concern over the ever dwindling timber rattler population, so in their infinite wisdom, they released 1000 of the critters into the state park.
Wawayanda State Park is a 34,350 acre state park in Sussex County and Passaic County in northern New Jersey. The park is in Vernon Township on the Sussex side, and West Milford on the Passaic side. There are 60 miles (96 km) of hiking trails in the park, including a 20-mile (32 km) stretch of the Appalachian Trail and the dens of thousands of timber rattle snakes thanks to the New Jersey Division of Parks and Forestry.
Only two big problems, nobody told the snakes to stay inside the state park limits or where those limits might be and within two years the population on my property increased exponentially, much to the demise of the poor misguided snakes who came to visit my property. Even had one crawl inside my garage and give need to a changing of my shorts after dealing with him. One year alone i killed almost two dozen of them, for the same reason as others mentioned, because they were not going to kill my daughter of our family dog if I had any say in the matter.
Second problem was that the park was frequented often by people from Bergen and Passaic County and also from Newark and the surrounding area where they would not know a rattle snake from an earth worm, nor would they expect to encounter one since they were very scarce, if not unheard of, in their home towns. Bet you can guess how some of those encounters turned out. Another fine example of "Were from government and here to help you".
What an idea: release "extra" poisonous snakes in a public-access area. :o That's bureaucracy at its finest!
Thinking even more on this, why not add viscous dogs and a toxic waste dump there, too?!?
Well I suppose they could import about 500 mongoose the deal with the snakes .The weasels would probabley get the snakes then breed like rats and before too long they'd have a million mongoose the deal with .
I sometimes wonder what in the world some of those environmentilest types are thinking .People in general do not like poisonous snakes for a reason .
Just look at history .The people in Ireland made Patrick a saint .Now weather he acually drove the snakes out of Ireland I can't say because obviously I wasn't there .Non the less good old St Pat gave us a day of celebration when everybody is Irish .On that day I'm Al O'Smith . ;)
The only good poisonous snake is a dead one. If it is not poisonous, I will usually let it go.
I saw a picture of a guy holding a rattler one time. The caption said he(the guy) was 6' tall. He had both elbows braced against his ribs with his hands out and upturned. The snake was across his hands. The head and about a foot of the snake was on the ground, the tail and about a foot was on the ground, the rest draped across his hands. It had to be at least 12 feet long. This is no tall tale. The snake's head was bigger than both the guy's fists held together.
I was driving one afternoon on I-10 just West of Sonora, TX once when I saw up ahead what I thought was a log across the L/H Westbound lane. Then I realized that there were few trees big enough to make a log out there. It was a huge rattler. When I passed it, it's head was already off the pavement but the tail and rattlers were still in the R/H lane. I got partially on the shoulder to avoid running over it. I was driving a Ford Explorer and was scared to run over the thing. I think it was the biggest snake I've ever seen.
Quote from: Tree Feller on April 16, 2013, 09:23:49 PM
I was driving one afternoon on I-10 just West of Sonora, TX once when I saw up ahead what I thought was a log across the L/H Westbound lane. Then I realized that there were few trees big enough to make a log out there. It was a huge rattler. When I passed it, it's head was already off the pavement but the tail and rattlers were still in the R/H lane. I got partially on the shoulder to avoid running over it. I was driving a Ford Explorer and was scared to run over the thing. I think it was the biggest snake I've ever seen.
I would have made a point of running over it. Maybe a few times if that is what it took to squash it properly.
Some years ago Linnea, my dog Smoke, and I came up on a timber rattler easily the size of the one in the truck bed. It blended into to background so well that the only reason we saw it was the dog barking at it. Timber rattlers are becoming increasingly rare around here. I have mixed feelings about that.
Now the feds are considering listing the eastern diamondback under the Endangered Species Act. We have been asked to participate in a survey anytime we see one. I responded that if I see one, I was going to give him a bus ticket back to Georgia, because he is lost.
Wudman
Quote from: Texas Ranger on April 15, 2013, 03:51:12 PM
I think the pygmy, along with copper heads, bother me the most, small enough to be unnoticed just laying there.
Most folks are smart enough not to pick up a decent sized rattler. Not so with the Pygmy.
There's a hunting/fishing/drinking/card playing etc. lodge on the Ga coast called Cabin Bluff. It dates back to the twenties, and oozes history, with photographs on the walls of previous guests in knee boots, tweed jackets, fine English made doubles, dog handlers and piles of game. You know the type.
There's no shortage of poisionous reptiles, I darned near stepped on a cottonmouth at the sporting clays course.
There is also a sorta strange layout golf course, with a half dozen or so fairways, another half dozen greens and a few different tee boxes. Several small ponds, including one full of bream that go silly over a #12 hopper pattern.
As you can imagine, they get more than their fair share of guests from among a population of folks that ain't from around here. Many of those want to try out the course, so they grab their clubs, or borrow some from the pro-shop, hop in a cart and give it a go. Even folks that don't appreciate gr*ts are smart enough not to run over a gator with a golf gart, but they've had 2 incidents in the last couple of years when people went to retrieve a golf ball, and while they were bent over decided to pick up that interesting snake laying there. After all, it's just a small snake, looks perfectly harmless. ::)
Quote from: Claybraker on April 17, 2013, 12:17:18 PM
Quote from: Texas Ranger on April 15, 2013, 03:51:12 PM
I think the pygmy, along with copper heads, bother me the most, small enough to be unnoticed just laying there.
There's a hunting/fishing/drinking/card playing etc. lodge on the Ga coast called Cabin Bluff. It dates back to the twenties, and oozes history, with photographs on the walls of previous guests in knee boots, tweed jackets, fine English made doubles, dog handlers and piles of game. You know the type.
You happen to know Steve Davis? I worked with him a few years back. He was a forester on Cabin Bluff. I'm not sure if he still manages it or not. One of the biggest issues there was with the hogs.
Wudman
Nope, did he work for Mead/Westvaco?
They've got sorta a love/hate relationship with hogs. They tear up a bunch of stuff, even with a fence and cattle guard at the main compound one will sneak in and the night watchman will have to dispatch it with a suppressed .22.
OTOH, folks that don't know any better will pay big money to come shoot a pig. Here's the the people from Eotech the morning after an outing:
http://cabinbluff.com/blog/2011/10/hog-hunting-at-cabin-bluff
Judging from the poor numbers, either they got tired of shooting, or somebody got tired of dragging hogs out of the woods. :)
Saw this guy walking through the woods this morning. He was kind enough to rattle before I got to him, because I was looking up at the trees and walking straight towards him. Timber rattler, about 5 feet long.
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/15533/Rattler.JPG)
Looks like you've been feeding him well. Is he still slithering about?
I'll kill a venomous snake if it's in my yard. Out in the woods, I leave them alone. That's where they're supposed to be.
I agree Dodgy, it just seems that the snakes around here have a hard time deciding with where the woods leave off and my yard starts.
I also fail to see where the lack of poisonous snakes is a bad thing. If they decrease, there will be more rats and mice and the numbers of non poisonous and other predators will increase.
I just hope the government does not take a hand like they did around here when some mental pygmy decided the lack of coyotes needed to be corrected.
I've killed two copperheads in my backyard in the last year and didn't think twice about it. I have an 18-month-old daughter who plays back there and I'm not going to take that risk. But I really don't mind them out in the woods. I think they are very cool animals and I actually enjoy seeing them. I just like it more when I see them before I'm one step away! I know I'm kind of weird like that, but going to forestry school with a bunch of wildlife majors will do that do you :)
I agree with you about the snakes, Dodgy. I actually wish I would see a timber rattler again (before I stepped on it or reached for something too close to it) :o
Massasauga rattlesnakes are the only venomous snake in Michigan. I've never seen one and hope I never do. http://www.michigan.gov/dnr/0,1607,7-153-10370_12145_12201-32995--,00.html
jeff, can we close this thread down please? :o
I guess Vermont technically does have venomous snakes. There is a very very small localized population of timber rattlesnakes down south near the Massachusetts border. Still far enough away from me though!
Shoot fire, down here, we have Fer de Lance. They get into the chicken coop, into my workshop, and are always killed by field workers with big weed whackers. They love to curl up under lumber piles and such. More deadly than Rattlers.
I even had to kill a Coral snake, going across the concrete floor where I had been working not 5 minutes before.
In case y'all don't know, Coral Snakes are in the Cobra family. Their bite will paralyze you, before you can get help, if you are away from people or civilization. ;D
I have only seen one that big here but a place we were working on last summer we ran into 12 of them. I am sure there were more, thankfully we did not see them. Here are a few.
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/16734/388023325_095846.jpg)
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/16734/388023405_418866.jpg)
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/16734/388023516_013389.jpg)
I would not kill them either if they would go to the places we have allready cleaned cedars up,but they keep coming up around the equipment and I do not like that. :D
Quote from: Sonofman on April 17, 2013, 06:58:44 PM
I also fail to see where the lack of poisonous snakes is a bad thing. If they decrease, there will be more rats and mice and the numbers of non poisonous and other predators will increase.
The farmers in SW Georgia learned about that the hard way. About 50 years ago, they established an annual "Rattlesnake Roundup" in that area and made a local festival of it. They were paying $1 a foot for rattlers, and they were captured by the thousands. After a few years of that, the area was almost overrun with rats and rabbits, which wreaked havoc on the field crops. The lesson here is that everything in nature has its purpose, no matter if we find it inconvenient. I have yet to divine the purpose of the mosquito though, unless it is just to keep us humble. ;)
If someone can find a useful purpose for fireants I'm all ears. ;)
That is a big one. I can't stand snakes.
Arizona is home to something like 13 species of rattlesnakes and one kind of coral snake, one poisonous lizard (gila monster) the most poisonous scorpion in North America.
I talked with the snakes and we have an agreement. They don't bite me and I don't kill any more of them. So far there is peace. I used to just summarily kill our giant centipedes, also poisonous, but one day I saw one carrying off a burn worm, a stinging caterpillar. Now they are my friends. Just never know.
My wife has a different postion, having lost one dog (two bitten), a horse and several cattle. She likes them less than I do and will not tolerate them, although I can see her point.
We used to have to move them at a nature park I worked at, sometimes several in a day. Most were pretty mellow, but some were so nasty they would bite themselves trying to get me. Then they became more relaxed. I don't think it killed them, just messed them up. Only had one person bitten there in over 20 years, and had over 100 snakes in about 50 acres. Did help to keep the rats down.
Quote from: Mooseherder on April 22, 2013, 07:38:33 PM
If someone can find a useful purpose for fireants I'm all ears. ;)
Mh, ants are farty little rascals(you hafta listen closely), and are the largest producers of Methane, a greenhouse gas. They may be the only thing standing between us and an ice age. ;D
Well, that does it.
If someone has to stand against something, then my archenemy is fireants.
I hates Fireants!
There will be no peace.
They are like trying to control stink. You may cover it up, but it will be back. We are in a never ending battle. :-\