Snakes

#126
#126
davethevol said:
Last time I saw one was about 12 years ago. I noticed a drop off in brown snakes in my yard years ago when I was spraying pest control on the lawn. I learned later that stuff eventually poisons snakes as well because they eat the critters that are affected, so I quit spraying. I wouldn’t be surprised if there are fewer common snakes like the green snake due to all the poisons people put in their yards.
Click to expand...

Agreed. I also quit spraying several years ago when I heard realized the impact on honey bee populations.
 
#127
#127
maxresdefault.jpg

Thirty Helens agree: Don't kill non-venomous beneficial snakes.
 
#128
#128
Last night my wife tells me that there were 2 snakes right outside our lanai (the long black one and a smaller one) all tangled up in an x-rated display of twisted "snake hiding". We may be selling this house!
 
#129
#129
Ok, here's my cat and coral snake story... going back several years ago. My wife and kids being "cat people" when I was on a start-up at a gas plant in north Texas in 2015, a little kitten whose mother lived in the plant's warehouse befriended me, so the plant people let me take her with me when my work was done. We rode together for 10 hours back home in my truck and while she climbed around a bit she never peed once and I became a cat convert (at least, there is one cat in this world I am quite fond of). Nowadays she stays at our house when I go to work, but for the first few months she commuted with me and would hang out around my warehouse. Behind the warehouse is a fence and ditch separating my property from the neighbors behind us (a handful of mobile homes). One day around noon I saw Kitty preparing to pounce on something in the ditch and when I went to see - it was a coral snake at least 3 foot long! So I grabbed Kitty and got out of there. Later that day one of those neighbors called and told me HIS cat had killed a coral snake... it was the same one my Kitty had almost tangled with. Pictures.
Kitty.JPGCoral Snake 2.JPG
 
  • Like
Reactions: TN-POSSUM, davethevol and Boca Vol
#130
#130
Well, the fangs of coral snakes are not on the front of their mouths, so they have to chew on their prey to inject venom. Their fangs are in the middle of their mouths. That’s why very few people have been injected with coral snake venom. Plus, they are a smaller sized snake.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Boca Vol
#131
#131
RavinDave said:
Ok, here's my cat and coral snake story... going back several years ago. My wife and kids being "cat people" when I was on a start-up at a gas plant in north Texas in 2015, a little kitten whose mother lived in the plant's warehouse befriended me, so the plant people let me take her with me when my work was done. We rode together for 10 hours back home in my truck and while she climbed around a bit she never peed once and I became a cat convert (at least, there is one cat in this world I am quite fond of). Nowadays she stays at our house when I go to work, but for the first few months she commuted with me and would hang out around my warehouse. Behind the warehouse is a fence and ditch separating my property from the neighbors behind us (a handful of mobile homes). One day around noon I saw Kitty preparing to pounce on something in the ditch and when I went to see - it was a coral snake at least 3 foot long! So I grabbed Kitty and got out of there. Later that day one of those neighbors called and told me HIS cat had killed a coral snake... it was the same one my Kitty had almost tangled with. Pictures.
View attachment 277453View attachment 277454
Click to expand...

That's a big snake.
 
  • Like
Reactions: RavinDave
#132
#132
hog88 said:
That's a big snake.
Click to expand...
It sure is. It had not occurred to me before that incident, that coral snakes are indigenous around here. I have since seen one about half that size, but that one the cat got was about as big as a coral snake gets.
 
#133
#133
RavinDave said:
Ok, here's my cat and coral snake story... going back several years ago. My wife and kids being "cat people" when I was on a start-up at a gas plant in north Texas in 2015, a little kitten whose mother lived in the plant's warehouse befriended me, so the plant people let me take her with me when my work was done. We rode together for 10 hours back home in my truck and while she climbed around a bit she never peed once and I became a cat convert (at least, there is one cat in this world I am quite fond of). Nowadays she stays at our house when I go to work, but for the first few months she commuted with me and would hang out around my warehouse. Behind the warehouse is a fence and ditch separating my property from the neighbors behind us (a handful of mobile homes). One day around noon I saw Kitty preparing to pounce on something in the ditch and when I went to see - it was a coral snake at least 3 foot long! So I grabbed Kitty and got out of there. Later that day one of those neighbors called and told me HIS cat had killed a coral snake... it was the same one my Kitty had almost tangled with. Pictures.
View attachment 277453View attachment 277454
Click to expand...
That's a badass cat
 
  • Like
Reactions: davethevol and RavinDave
#134
#134
VolunteerHillbilly said:
probably vulnerables with a co-morbidity
Click to expand...
One was a kid in Dickson, found some "fishing worms" which was a nest of baby copperheads .Got bitten several times and died. Young snakes tend to inject all their venom, adults dose it out. The other case was a friends grandfather, don't know the details on him. Copperheads, like most snakes will leave you alone unless they are shedding, then they are blind and will strike at anything that moves. I've had cows and dogs bitten over the years.
 
#135
#135
zooguy said:
Well, the fangs of coral snakes are not on the front of their mouths, so they have to chew on their prey to inject venom. Their fangs are in the middle of their mouths. That’s why very few people have been injected with coral snake venom. Plus, they are a smaller sized snake.
Click to expand...
True, but they compensate for a less-than-optimum delivery system with a rather potent venom.

That same cat, a year or two later, was presumably bitten in the face by a copperhead (in our backyard).

Whatever it was, it caused her head to swell to twice its normal size.

The vet put her on an antivenin drip overnight and within a few days she was good as new.
 
#136
#136
LampVol said:
One was a kid in Dickson, found some "fishing worms" which was a nest of baby copperheads .Got bitten several times and died. Young snakes tend to inject all their venom, adults dose it out. The other case was a friends grandfather, don't know the details on him. Copperheads, like most snakes will leave you alone unless they are shedding, then they are blind and will strike at anything that moves. I've had cows and dogs bitten over the years.
Click to expand...

Heard the same story growing up in VA.

Going to chalk that one up to an old wives tail.
 
  • Like
Reactions: feathersax and TN-POSSUM
#137
#137
hog88 said:
Heard the same story growing up in VA.

Going to chalk that one up to an old wives tail.
Click to expand...

I’ve never seen a nest of any snakes. I’ve heard a similar story growing up where somebody jumped in a lake or pond or whatever body of whatever into a nest of water moccasins. Lol. Completely absurd but some people believe it.
 
  • Like
Reactions: TN-POSSUM
#138
#138
Don't know if the "appropriate" name is nest or not but I have had to kill multiple "groups" of poisonous snakes cohabitating together Usually hibernating, but my wife's great aunt lived in an old mountain homestead close to a creek in Wilkes County NC with a natural dirt root cellar basement stone foundation walls type place. About every other year we would kill 10-30 copperheads down there for 25 years after her husband passed away. When she moved in with another relative in her late 80s I was so happy you couldn't believe it and the county or town one bought the house and razed to make it into a park. I always wanted to have 5 gallons of gas and match when we went there.

With you on the old wives tales of water moccasins mostly because unless its breeding season they are very solitary snakes, but I will tell you a couple of things. Cotton mouths are very territorial and is the only venomous snake in NA that is aggressive in and of itself (not stepped on or aggravated like a rattlesnake warns). People have also told me that a snake cant bite underwater but I always said I can bite underwater they probably can too. I was canoe fishing in a small creek in Eastern NC many years ago and saw fish walking across the water towards me. After doing a double take (and no alcohol was involved) and as the walking fish got closer it was a live raccoon perch in the jaws of a cottonmouth and that snake swam up to the canoe with that fish and was trying to get in or run me off one. I am back paddling as hard as I can and looking for my old pistol I kept in the tackle box and wound up shooting that snake. He didn't catch that fish sitting on the bank lol.
I do not kill non poisonous snakes anywhere, I will relocate them around the house and in general don't kill venomous snakes unless they are where I don't want them close to people or my pets or try to get in a tiny boat with me.
 
#139
#139
zooguy said:
Well, the fangs of coral snakes are not on the front of their mouths, so they have to chew on their prey to inject venom. Their fangs are in the middle of their mouths. That’s why very few people have been injected with coral snake venom. Plus, they are a smaller sized snake.
Click to expand...
Yeah usually they are a lot smaller than that one appears to be. That is a really nice sized Coral snake and remember coral snakes are also almost completely nocturnal and prefer moist environments like rotting logs, stump holes, rock ledges, etc... so human coral snake interaction is relatively rare unless you are turning stuff over looking for them. All my 50+ years hunting, fishing, hiking, and camping in NC, Va, Tn, Ga, SC, FLa. I have only ever seen three that I can remember.
 
#140
#140
C-south said:
I’ve never seen a nest of any snakes. I’ve heard a similar story growing up where somebody jumped in a lake or pond or whatever body of whatever into a nest of water moccasins. Lol. Completely absurd but some people believe it.
Click to expand...

This will put the fear of God in everyone.
 
#143
#143
joevol33 said:
Snakes never have bothered me. They handle them in some churches where I'm from😂. Have a good friend who catches them for a church, rattlesnakes and copperhead. Always take my kids to see them when we visit ky😄
Click to expand...

I believe Kenny Chesney has a song about this (Big Revival) about the church on Eagle Mountain.
 
  • Like
Reactions: joevol33
#145
#145
csmize said:
This will put the fear of God in everyone.
Click to expand...


Those snakes built that building to make a home under it? A lot of snakes will den up together especially in the winter. Most snakes lay eggs and cut out and most of the ones that bear live young do the the same.
 
#146
#146
About every other year my mom will send me a picture of a young black snake she’s killed asking “is this poisonous?” Not sure why she asks when the process is always kill it first then ask me. She’s deathly afraid of all snakes, I kept many as pets growing up and occasionally one would liberate itself from the tank inside the house. If I wanted to live I had to find that snake before she saw it.903E0EC8-27F4-4985-AB43-C1B9F825DC03.jpegFound this one hanging out on our patio table last summer. Got it into the Ivy before the dogs could go after it.
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: feathersax, K-town Vol Fan, TN-POSSUM and 2 others
#147
#147
DancingOutlaw said:
About every other year my mom will send me a picture of a young black snake she’s killed asking “is this poisonous?” Not sure why she asks when the process is always kill it first then ask me. She’s deathly afraid of all snakes, I kept many as pets growing up and occasionally one would liberate itself from the tank inside the house. If I wanted to live I had to find that snake before she saw it.View attachment 279428Found this one hanging out on our patio table last summer. Got it into the Ivy before the dogs could go after it.
Click to expand...

Nice looking king snake.
 
New posts
You must log in or register to reply here.

VN Store



Back
Top