Tuesday, April 16, 2013

Don't tread on me.

Nose-to-nose with a fair-sized eastern diamondback rattler. Thankful for the glass.

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11 comments:

Bob said...

I lived in Florida for my first 17 years, and in that time only saw two Eastern Diamondbacks in the wild. It's pretty uncommon to see snakes anyway (water snakes can be an exception), and venomous snakes in particular. All total I've had less than a dozen encounters with venomous snakes in my lifetime (I'm 51). Still, a favorite childhood memory is seeing the late herpetologist Ross Allen walk into an enclosure at Silver Springs, Florida, that was wall-to-wall with live rattlesnakes. Good times.

2:53 AM, April 17, 2013
NAVIGATOR said...

PICKLED RATTLESNAKE YUM !

"TASTES LIKE CHICKEN"

PREFER THE TINNED VARIETY

6:57 AM, April 17, 2013
Old NFO said...

Good eating, and get em before they get too big (tough)... :-) Sounds like a good day out!

8:10 AM, April 17, 2013
Robert said...

My brother used to milk rattlesnakes for tourists at a roadside zoo. He has some hillarious stories about it.

8:49 AM, April 17, 2013
Anonymous said...

I understand that an excellent way to prevent being bitten by a rattlesnake is to frantically wave a hiking pole at it while falling backwards. It is also a good method for quickly elevating your heart rate.

9:25 AM, April 17, 2013
staghounds said...

Stepped over TWO of them on a sunny day in February. "What's that buzzing... RUN AWAAAAAAAY!"

9:45 AM, April 17, 2013
Stuart the Viking said...

When I was in the Marines, there was a Corporal that I worked with who would go out running in the hills just off base at lunch every day wearing just his go-fasters (running shoes) and pink running shorts. I called him Corp. Superman. Dude was FIT.

He would run strait out until he saw a coyote, then he would spend the next hour following it (much to the annoyance of the coyote I presume). Eventually, the coyote would get tired of the game and run right past a rattlesnake, presumably in an attempt to shake the good Corporal off his tail (this happened far too often to be mere coincidence in my opinion).

A few times, when the rattler was large enough, Corp. Superman would snag a nearby rock, kill the rattler, and saw off it's head with whatever sharp-ish think he could find handy. He would then wrap it around his neck and run back to base. I cured and mounted a few of these skins for him.

I can just imagine the MP's faces when he ran through the gate to get back on base with a dead rattler wrapped around his neck. As a joke, we told people he chewed the head off with his teeth. It was surprising how many people believed us.

s

12:05 PM, April 17, 2013
WindRider said...

I was gratified last year to discover that even in my late 60's I have apparently not lost the ability to reflexively jump past a rattlesnake should one suddenly appear nestled near our house. Guess it's hard-wired in.

12:51 PM, April 17, 2013
LCB said...

My parents grew up in the "badlands" of south eastern Kentucky. I heard so many stories at my grandpah's of "Uncle Zeb killed a rattler under the dinning room table" and "Grandmah killed a copperhead right there under the rain barrel" and so on...that I grew up with a very, very healthy respect for snakes.

Didn't help that when I was 5 or 6 or maybe 7...I wondered out to grandpah's barn, opened the door to the tack room (the floor of which was about two feet higher than the floor of the barn)...and had a coiled snake hiss at me like a cobra. I screamed all the way back to the house.

My uncle told me that he just moved the snake, hoping it would keep me out of the barn. But I know now...to the folks that grew up on that area, the only good snake was a dead snake.

Black snakes are not poisonous...but they are dah mean...

1:00 PM, April 17, 2013
BobG said...

I've eaten a share of diamondbacks, but never an eastern rattler. We still run into rattlers here in Salt Lake Valley at times in the foothills and the west side of the valley.

4:10 PM, April 17, 2013
Mockingbird said...

Living near the FL/GA line, I walk the trails of state parks, and at the edge of the Okefenokee Swamp on the weekends. For 50 years. I don't see the rattlers out and about anymore. Most of us know where they live-in the Gopher Tortoise holes. The two species get along, unlike rattlers vs city folks.

6:51 PM, April 17, 2013

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