From Priclky Pear to RATTLESNAKES...

Hey Shin -

Dubious privilege - indeed! Sure hope he gets his money's worth out of the museum.

A rattlesnake's strike range is roughly 1/3-1/2 its body length, meaning 2' to 3' or so at a maximum. I think it's correct to say they'll never *chase* you. Jumping away and taking a few steps further, or running with hair on fire, won't matter to the snake, it might move forward if that was where it was going to begin with, sit coiled still if it was set up waiting for a rodent in an ambush location, or if, as would be likely at that point, itself disturbed and alarmed, be sounding its rattle constantly, looping coils into the air, but likely defensively backing away or to the side although certainly ready to bite anything within range. To jump away and run in panic mode would increase your chances of injury from an unrelated fall, or especially if in a true den location, outright stepping on another one you haven't noticed yet. Circumstances can be different but IF you know where the snake is, a quick step or two or three away from its location particularly if into an open area, even if simply a reflexive, adrenalized reaction, shouldn't be a horribly stupid thing to do. Then look around to be sure you aren't going to step on a different one, and move further away.

There are a few reports of harmless snakes like racers being kinda silly-aggressive towards humans during their spring mating season, following folks around striking at them. I've personally seen *very* aggressive behavior by cottonmouths, several actually moving towards a friend and myself when we happened on an isolated pool in a swamp during a spring drought that had concentrated quite a few of them into a small area. So, I'm reluctant to say a rattler would never, ever, perhaps as a matter of very individualized temperament, move forward a few feet towards a perceived threat, trying to bite. But chasing for a distance because you were running? Never. (Larger tropical pit vipers like fer-de-lance may behave differently.)

I admire the natural world and a phobic sort of fear of snakes has never been in my constitution; that's made it easier to seek information and observe closely and carefully. I *do* have a jittery response to heights (I've never gone on a ferris wheel, even, much less a roller coaster) and somewhat to wasps and spiders. I happily kill off black widows around our property, rather to DW's amusement since she takes them quite casually. But rattlesnakes? Here's an analogy: say you're walking, crossing a busy street at an intersection and pause on a traffic island when the light catches you midway. There are 2000-3000 lb pieces of metal moving past you now in both directions at 10-30 mph, controlled by humans of totally unknown intelligence, ability, and motives. Other than watching for some obvious sudden danger, do you feel fearful, threatened, or ever randomly jump and run in a panic? I submit you're in much more real danger at such a moment than you'd be when, say, six feet away from any rattlesnake in North America.

Good ID dryheat. I actually came upon this bull snake friday. And it was a big one. I had him the sights of the judge and was ready to claim my largest rattler kill. He is still out there slithering around.
The snake we caught out of the den on the mouse is actually in one of the pics being put in the can. You can see the monofilament line coming out of his mouth.
That den was 60 ft from our foundation. It was under a volkswagon size rock. I was able to dig it up and move it down hill . Then I dug the rest of it up and filled it in solid. Our neighbors were a little disapponted as they had gased a lot of snakes out of it the past. There is no shortage of rocks to crawl under here. That was to close for comfort.

here is one of my homemade traps. staple down mouse stick pads close the lid and place next to foundation.
I had a call from a customer of mine. She killed a small rattler last week. She lives on the edge of town and had never seen on before. I dropped off a trap on monday. She called this morning she saw her second rattler, this one in my trap.
Im going to make some more traps
this weekend. Ill put up pictures of the new and improved model.

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Kinda sad to see the lizards getting killed off by that method, and any harmless snakes, too, obviously. I'd not do it, but it's cheaper and easier than funnel trap designs and rattlers being thick around a residence obviously call for some sort of control process. One suggestion might be to simply deliberately lay a number of medium-sized sheets of scrap tin roofing or plywood out around your property in such a way you can flip them up safely (maybe a rope attached) and deal appropriately with whatever's sheltered under them overnight. Shade is a precious commodity for anything living in cactus scrub so you'll usually locate a lot of critters on your own terms that way.

Alaska -

Thanks for posting the pic of your trap. Very ingenious design.

I will have to download pics from my camera to show what my trapper uses. It would be more along the lines of what Dryheat describes, a funnel type set up.

He has been using the same trap for many years, but did have to reinforce the top 2 years ago, as the large snakes were managing to push it lose enough to escape.

Look forward to seeing your new & improved model.

Oh man, no lack of rocks around here either. Big ones, bigger ones, little ones - plenty of any size.

Sorry to hear about your snake trouble. I feel your pain. Luckily not your DH's. We have lived out here where the deer and the rattle snakes play for almost 33 years. The best advice I can give is get things cleaned up, sealed off and be prepared. After a while, you will develop a "feeling" and being relaxed, but on the look out will become natural. We don't walk out up on our front porch at night without a light and stomping our feet. We have learned to listen for the "buzz" without having to concentrate on it. And we never under any circumstances flip over anything with our hands! Even though it might not be a rattler under there, scorpions are real terrors! By the way, chickens, turkeys, and cats are very helpful. And learn the difference between a bull snake and other good snakes. I rode up into the yard on horseback one day and saw a bull snake eating a rattler. After I gagged, I went in the house and let him enjoy his meal! Again, Good Luck! Stay Safe!

Thanks for the well wishes and very practical advice. I noticed (after the incident) the country folks around there seem to always be looking at the ground, scanning the land. Now I realize why. Duh! Also good tip to stomp your feet. I have read that rattlesnakes are not aggressive toward humans. As long as we let them know we are coming (and not step on them) they will hopefully go on & move out of the way.

I have learned so much here on HT about snakes and pp cactus this last week. It has not discouraged me from taking on this monumental project, it actually has me fired up to get started! So much to get in order before we can move.

Oh heavens - that is funny!! Made me spew iced tea all over my keyboard. (I would have gagged too)

BTW, I currently live in the only "big" city in New Mexico. How do you like living down south? Most of NM is enchanting in some form or another - don't you agree?!

I live in SW NM where we have a few rattlers, but not that many. There are lots more bull snakes, garter snakes, and coachwhips than rattlers. And, fortunately most of the rattlers around here are blacktails, which are pretty docile and non-agressive. I killed one on my back porch a couple of years ago and another a couple of weeks later near the same area. A .22 rifle with a snake shot load seems to be the best way to deal with them. Just hold it like a pistol, stay back a ways, point it right at the snake's face, and POW. Snake is done for and bullets don't go ricocheting off across the neighborhood.



But if I'm out and around the backcountry (lots of that here) and I see one, I just live and let live. Here's one I flipped off the trail with my walking stick.

Indigo snake is an enemy to the rattler. They eat them.

http://www.wanderingherpetologist.co...e-rattlesnake/

That above link has amazing photos of an indigo chowing down a rattler! Thanks! It got me to search up the Drymarchon (indigo genus) distribution in Texas to see if just perhaps they were known to get anywhere close to NM, but they really don't, it appears within a couple hundred miles is as near as any have been found. Why? Because gopher/bull snakes aren't known to eat other snakes. That's based on museum and university folks listing stomach contents (a *fine* job, lol) from many, many thousands of them, ones found dead on roads as well as randomly collected live ones that were then euthanized and gone over for diet info, parasites, taxonomy (body structure) and so forth. It would be really big news if that species were documented as feeding on any snakes, much less rattlers. My guess might then be Chief Cook saw possibly a large coachwhip doing in a rattler, that species does eat snakes (and most anything else, much as king snakes do) and is pretty variable in coloration including a mostly tan or brown color over most of its body, here's an image at this link: http://www.arkive.org/coachwhip/masticophis-flagellum/ Coachwhips can be *really* big, too, upwards of over 7' long.

Black indigos are pretty prevalent around here, so would probably be at Texas Red's place also. Turns out she's moving about 40 miles from where I live. Around here they are called black bull snakes. They do love chicken eggs, as I can testify to and get really large. I had one in the hen house a few years ago that was about 6', but they are docile enough to catch easily.

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I may disagree with what you have to say, but I shall defend, to the death, your right to say it. Attributed to Voltaire

I've seen a few Desert Kingsnakes around NM. They are beautiful snakes, and are one of a rattlesnake's worst enemies.

http://www.kingsnake.com/hudspeth/kingsnake.htm

http://www.kingsnake.com/king/getula/splendida.html

gila dog - You live in a pretty part of NM. And lucky you, hardly any rattlesnakes. I have never seen (or heard of) a black tail rattler. Very distinct in coloring. The darn diamondbacks just blend into the surroundings at my Texas place. Thanks for the pics and shooting tips.

Desert king snakes too - oh my! Thanks for the links. The second article stated they aren't common in arid grassy areas, but like the shady areas in Mesquite brush near a source of water. Great, I have too many Mesquite too. And creeks. I thank the Lord I haven't had more close encounters with snakes on the place. My sis & I are pretty casual when we go out hiking. No more!
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mreynolds - Wow, amazing pictures of the indigo scarfing the rattlesnake! I need to get several of those and toss them under the house for a feast of a lifetime. Thanks for sharing that link.
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Dryheat - As always, thanks for educating us on the finer points of snakes. I am grateful for the herp lessons. Is it true a rattler cannot strike from a coiled position? I have read conflicting info. Looking forward to our trip to the Rattlesnake Museum - should be very interesting. I'll report back if they are hiring any specialists. Just in case you are looking for a new career.
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Belfrybat - I am glad to know these indigo or black bull snakes are common around our neighborhood. If I don't have any, I want to get some. Sure seems like I need to diversify my snake species.

My hen house will need an overhaul after being idle for so long- I sure don't want any snakes in there eating up my eggs! Don't remember that being a problem when I was a kid, but may have just been part of the ranch life and not a dinner table discussion.

Thanks for the sharing and advice everyone. I appreciate all the help. I'm looking forward to the move in spite of this discussion!

Re desert kingsnakes... if you see one be glad. They are harmless to people, but death to rattlenakes, mice, packrats, etc. Same for bullsnakes (aka gopher snakes). I like seeing the good guys, and always give them a break if I can. When I see a bullsnake crossing a road I try and stop and shoo him off the road with my walking stick. Bullsnakes look like rattlenakes (except for no rattle, a small head, and round eyes) and will act like rattlesnakes sometimes. They will coil up, shake their tail, and make a rattling noise in their throat. They may even strike at you if you mess with them. But they are definitely on our side and I leave them alone or even try and help them if I can. I've always heard that if you have bullsnakes around there won't be any rattlers. I don't know how true that is, tho.

Here's a pic of a bullsnake I chased off a road a while back. It's a bit hard to see, but he has a small head (a rattler's head is more triangle shaped) and round eyes (a rattler's eyes are a bit "hooded"):



When you go hiking it's a good idea to take a walking stick. You can poke around in the weeds, brush, and rocks, and scare up things that you might otherwise step on. Also, during the warm months, don't wander around outside at night without a flashlight. That's when snakes become more active, and if you don't see one, step on him, and get bit, you are in for a really bad adventure.

One more pic of a blacktail rattler. This guy was in my camp one morning when I got up. I gathered up my stuff and left. There was no reason to kill him. Notice the shape of his head, his fat cheeks, and his hooded eyes.

They can lash out and bite and inject venom (or not, their option) from any position. I suppose I've more often heard people implying one *needed* to be in a coiled position to strike. A frequent behavior, ambush hunting, is to hunker down in resting coils next to a rabbit or rodent trail (which they can identify by odor) and wait, even for days, for something to blunder up within a foot or so of their head so they can nail it. Of course, they'll also explore around looking for nice helpless nests of suckling rats and rabbits like harmless snakes are doing all the time, too.

The various pit vipers also can, and will, jab a fang and inject venom through their own lower jaw skin into the fingers of any silly inexperienced "snake catcher" who's done an ill-advised "pin and grasp behind the head" process but wrapped fingers too far out under the jaw. And, it's true that a decapitated head can still bite and inject venom for quite a while after being chopped off, like an hour or more.

My father told me a story about when he was working on King Ranch in his twenties. The ranch hands had a semi wild pet indigo they kept out at the barn. He was fat and lazy. When he wanted to eat he would go wait by the ranch boss truck and the boss would let him in and drive around until he saw a rattler. He would open the door and let him eat and come back and get him later. He would be no more than thirty feet from where he ate and hear the truck and let himself be picked back up to ride back to the barn.

He did say that he never saw this so it could have been a likely story told by the campfire. One day though they put him in my dads truck as a joke. He was under the seat until the truck was cranked and he took off. Then the Indigo crawled out. It sacred my dad so bad that he left the truck in gear and jumped out. The snake jumped out after him looking for his dinner and couldn't find anything but the truck ended up stopping on a mesquite tree.

Dad said Boss was more worried about his snake than the truck or my dad.

Always loved my dads stories. No matter how many times I hear them.

Here are the snake traps I build. Simply staple in the sticky glue traps. Just be careful when removing. Most of the time the snakes have been dead by the time I have checked traps.
I had to brand them. We do not brand our cattle. lazy B or my initails or large breast take your pick.

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mreynolds - Great story! Thanks for sharing it. I too miss the stories my Dad used to tell about life on the ranch.

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Alaska - Thanks for the LB Rattlesnake Trap tutorial. Nice work. I like the simple, yet effective concept of your design. I imagine you can use these over and over for quite awhile. The branding is a great touch

Do you place these traps in a strategic place or just randomly around your yard? What is it that attracts the snakes to them?

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General Question: DH and I were discussing the snake issue today and he asked me why we continue to catch rattlers in our trap after all these years. In other words, where are they coming from? I couldn't readily answer him. The foundation of the house is (hopefully) sealed up everywhere except the "chute" leading into the trap. Just curious what thoughts anyone might have on this.

Glad I asked, can't always trust what you read randomly on the Internet or hear at the feed store.

Amazing a severed head can still bite for up to an hour later! I'll remember that if I ever use the shovel method for dispatching a snake.

We were told at the ER something like 75% of venemous snakebites involve some form of alcohol and males between the age of 18 - 30. Something along the lines of "Hey, hold my beer - Watch this..."