Welcome to the country! Snakes edition

[Scott Douglas]

My brother was having his propane tank moved yesterday and the guy doing the move told him that the guy that fills them once found a rattler under the fill valve cover on the top of the tank. His neighbor told him the UPS driver ran over the biggest rattler he'd seen in the area last year on their common driveway.
He's also found skins around his place too, from when they shed.

[craigster59]

Originally Posted by mattdavis11

It was a surprise for sure! If it had been a rattler, you, me and the dog would have had a bad evening!

Hey Matt, you're rich!!!

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/disaster-girl-makes-over-430-000-selling-the-nft-of-her-meme-11619540211

[mattdavis11]

Originally Posted by craigster59

Hey Matt, you're rich!!!

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/disaster-girl-makes-over-430-000-selling-the-nft-of-her-meme-11619540211

LOL! Knowing my fortune is secure, I'll probably get sued!

[Evans, Marv]

The last one I saw here was 2+ ft. long and hanging out under my tractor in the shade. It instantly coiled & started buzzing when I approached. I tried to get it up onto a long, wood broom handle. After a few tries, it seemed to think coiling & rattling was futile & just wanted to get out of there. I finally got it onto the broom handle and put it in the plants on the slope above my driveway. I never kill them. The biggest one I ever saw was dead & hanging over a barbed wire fense next to a dirt road used a lot by illegal immgrants It was over six ft. long and as big or bigger than my forearm. There were always rattlers hanging on that fence. Maybe killed by the Mexicans crossing over from the border.

[Baz]

In all the years I have been in the landscaping business I have never had any run ins with poisonous snakes. NONE! Never even saw any. I do my share of working in brush and wooded areas too.

Plenty of friendly snakes though. They are almost like residents on certain properties I visit! I love to see them!

Here's a gorgeous little corn snake that hangs out at my place.......

[red-beard]

Originally Posted by Seahawk

In Maryland? The farm is along a marsh and then bordered by by woods. I am surrounded. The little mnemonic I learned about the coral snake is “red touch yellow, kill a fellow.”

What the **** does that mean!

Meet Corey. He isn't feeling too well today - Red touch yellow

[masraum]

Originally Posted by Baz

In all the years I have been in the landscaping business I have never had any run ins with poisonous snakes. NONE! Never even saw any. I do my share of working in brush and wooded areas too.

Plenty of friendly snakes though. They are almost like residents on certain properties I visit! I love to see them!

Here's a gorgeous little corn snake that hangs out at my place.......

beautiful little snake.

Originally Posted by red-beard

Meet Corey. He isn't feeling too well today - Red touch yellow

Also a pretty little snake. It's unfortunate that he came where he was unwanted.

I saw something cool this weekend. I was sitting on the couch inside and glanced outside at exactly the same time that a mockingbird landed in the yard. It looked like he was trying to pounce on a bug which I see them do all of the time. What made this different is that I saw him hop, hop, hop, a few times as if he was pursuing something. On the second or third hop, I noticed that what he was chasing was a snake. I could only just barely make out the top of the snake here and there as its body rose and fell through the grass.

The thing is, this all happened in the blink of an eye. The snake has hauling arse. It was practically up on a plane and the mocking bird was in hot pursuit.

I didn't get a great look at the snake. I think it was tan/light brown, but I can't say for sure, and it could have been 2-3' long, but I can't say for sure. He made it from my yard to the safety of the hay field next door. That's when a second mocking bird joined the first sitting on the top of the barbed wire fence staring into the deep grass.

I take our dog outside several times a day. I look around to ensure that I'm not going to put him down with any snakes around because he doesn't see well, and would likely follow his nose right up to a snake for a sniff, and he would be unlikely to be able to dodge a snake bite. He's old enough that I don't want to have to worry about him recovering from a snake bite.

I've been wandering around the property looking for snakes. I think they are neat, as long as they aren't a big surprise. I have yet to see one other than the one on the porch with the full belly and the one being chased by the mockingbirds. I guess the year is young. I've got the whole summer to find more. I just hope it's not a huge surprise when I do.

I did joint the "National Snakebite Support" group on Facebook. It's a group of Drs and Vets that answer questions about snakebites for people and animals.

It's crazy how much of a lack of knowledge there is in the medical community about snakebite treatment. I've read a bunch of stories where hospitals either treat inadequately or just completely wrong.

If anyone is curious about the correct treatment for rattle snakes, moccasins and copperheads (not coral snakes), here:

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21291549/

Here's a good copy of the chart.


Then the NSS group led me to the WSED (Wild Snakes : Education and Discussion) group...

https://wsed.org/coexisting-with-wild-snakes-revised-version/

[Scott Douglas]

My brother and his son ran into this guy when moving some siding the other day.
Gotta be careful lifting stuff up around his place...



They chopped off the head and put it and the body out on his front wall. Body was gone 5 minutes later but they don't know what took it.

[74-911]

This is the part of the country I grew up in.... they be rattlesnakes everywhere.

The Sweetwater Rattlesnake Roundup:

https://www.npr.org/sections/pictureshow/2020/04/03/821397097/rattlesnake-roundup-a-texas-community-tradition

https://www.google.com/search?q=sweetwater+rattlesnake+roundup&rlz=1C1CHBF_enUS939US939&sxsrf=ALeKk01AUOVxti_JMjAOGeK-vUYKmUDQ4A:1620685851987&tbm=isch&source=iu&ictx=1&fir=7KUd4mh_HUiFcM%252CHJOg81sEXHG6FM%252C_&vet=1&usg=AI4_-kTH7lqpaQEo5Ta-ixX_saaJ8FlIrQ&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiewv-jlcDwAhVbOs0KHQU4AYMQ9QF6BAggEAE#imgrc=7KUd4mh_HUi FcM

[drcoastline]

Lightly breaded and fried with a little hot sauce is how I like mine. Someone else can do the catchin, cookin and cleanin.

[Jims5543]

Being a land surveyor I see my share of snakes, poisonous are very rare.

I chaperoned school a trip years ago with my younger son, they went to a Seminole Indian reservation that had a reptile / snake presentation. I remember the words of the man giving the presentation to this day. He said, 80% of snake bites occur due to the person(s) that encountered the snake messing with it.

If you see a snake, avoid it, it will be gone in a matter of minutes, it does not want anything to do with you. I understand there are exceptions to that rule, except it is a good rule.

In years past I have encountered water moccasins and rattle snakes. In the case of the water moccasin, we decided it was going to eventually kill us if we did not kill it, we failed but almost got bit screwing with it.

I think I posted this pic here already in pics on your cel phone. I came across this very healthy Coral Snake a few weeks back, I was heading to put a stake where he was laying. I changed my plans, 1 minute later he was long gone.

[red-beard]

Most of the poisonous sneks (danger noodles) are night active. But the red touchy yellow fellow (Coral) is day active. And my under standing, that is the really deadly snek in the USA

[masraum]

Originally Posted by red-beard

Most of the poisonous sneks (danger noodles) are night active. But the red touchy yellow fellow (Coral) is day active. And my under standing, that is the really deadly snek in the USA

https://www.livescience.com/43938-coral-snakes-colors-bites-farts-facts.html

They have the second-strongest venom of any snake (the black mamba has the most deadly venom), but they are generally considered less dangerous than rattlesnakes because coral snakes have a less effective poison-delivery system.

Bite

According to the New Mexico Department of Game and Fish, unlike most other venomous snakes, the coral snake cannot contract its fangs into its mouth. Instead, they are constantly out and erect. Their fangs are relatively weak.

According to National Geographic, though their venom is highly toxic, no deaths from coral snake bites have been reported in North America since the late 1960s, when antivenin was developed. No deaths from a Western coral snake have been reported at all. Nevertheless, their bites can be extremely painful and, if left untreated, can lead to cardiac arrest.

Coral snakes’ small, fixed fangs and small mouth mean that it is difficult for them to puncture human skin — let alone leather boots. Humans are mostly bitten when trying to pick up a coral snake. Because of their small size, these snakes don’t carry much venom in their fangs, so they may try to hold onto their victim for some time.

According to Viernum, “One of the most distinctive behavioral characteristics of coral snakes is how they deliver their venom. Since their fangs are short and fixed, they deliver their venom through chewing motions.” She described this process as “similar to the way Gila monsters deliver their venom to prey.”

The snake’s neurotoxic venom causes rapid paralysis and respiratory failure in its prey; however, according to the National Institutes of Health, it can take many hours for symptoms to appear in humans. Additionally, there is often little or no pain or swelling in humans from a coral snake bite. If untreated by antivenom, however, symptoms will take effect. They include slurred speech, double vision, and muscular paralysis.

on a more entertaining note.

Coral snakes are slender and small, typically between 18 and 20 inches long (45 to 50 centimeters), with some species reaching 3 feet (1 meter). According to DesertUSA, the Western coral snake can be as skinny as a pencil. They have bulbous, almost-neckless heads, rounded noses and similar-looking tails, meaning that it can be hard to tell a snake’s head from its tail.

They use this characteristic to fool attackers by burying their heads in their coiled bodies and raising their tails — which look quite similar to their heads. “The idea for this behavior is that it’s always better to lose your tail than your head,” Viernum said.

When provoked, coral snakes will sometimes make a popping sound by expelling air from their cloaca, a single opening for the urinary, reproductive and intestinal tract, to startle the threat. According to researcher Joseph F. Gemano Jr. in an article in Reptiles magazine, these "microfarts" have been observed in other species, such as the Western hook-nosed snake. Scientists disagree about the behavior's purpose. Some have speculated that it is a mating call, but Gemano said that in his research, the fart was always associated with an aggressive-defensive behavior.

[oldE]

We only see small garter snakes around here and it seems they are becoming increasingly rare since the hawks have proliferated. Thinking about it I don't believe I have seen a snake in the fields in about three years.
I suspect the fox and coyotes are making their lives hard too.

Best
Les

[masraum]

Interesting. Posted by Dr Greene on faceplant

"A few people have privately asked me if there’s been any fatalities from eastern coral snakes, because I mentioned in a different post that there are no documented human fatalities from Texas coral snake envenomations.

A few of us just published this article in the American Journal of Emergency Medicine. We looked at all fatalities following native snakebites in the United States between 1989 and 2018. We identified one death from an eastern coral snake. 2006. The victim did not seek medical attention.

The species could be identified in the majority of cases. When species identification was available, it was the timber rattlesnake, Crotalus horridus, that was responsible for the most deaths. 22 victims. Many of whom did not seek treatment. They were five deaths attributed to copperheads. Two attributed to cottonmouths. Five attributed to eastern diamondback rattlesnakes. If memory serves, I think they were four deaths from western Diamondbacks and four from Prairie rattlesnakes."

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0735675720307774?fbclid=IwAR3jC2VtnbEds6iIvSDsSjo j49pRWZ400TjpwM9pr0s84OtQc6yBLdcbxwc