🚀 go-pugleaf

robk@hal.COM (Robert Kleinschmidt) wrote:

>This weekend I wound up killing a rattlesnake that had taken up
>residence in a foot high crawl space under the deck. 

>When I discovered it, I first called animal control, who offered
>to remove it sometime maybe if nothing more important came up.
>I locked the dogs in the house, waited around til almost sunset,
>and finally when they still had not shown, decided that I was
>running out of light, and not feel comfortable leaving the snake
>that close to the kids and animals.

>I finally set up a light, attached a garden rake to a length of
>pipe, and put on gloves, boots, jacket, and a pair of soccer
>shin-guards. I doused the snake with cold water, which seemed to
>slow it down, then pulled it out with the rake and dispatched it.

>I might possibly have been able to snare it with a noose and
>relocate it, but this did not strike me as a good do-it-yourself
>project if you don't know what you are doing.

>Any snake handlers out there ? Any good way to fence or protect
>the underside of a deck ? Seems to be the hot weather that makes
>them look for cooling off places.

>I feel badly about having to do this, and would have left it
>alone if it were further away from the house. Not sure
>if there was a better solution, but would love to hear one.


I am of the old school so far as rattle snakes are concerne!.  Their
bite while not necessarily fatal is dreadfully disableing and subject
to a wide range of medical complications during the recovery period.
The necessary amputation of an arm or a leg often is the result.  I
and my neighbor have seen 4 or 5 dogs pay the price for an encounter
with these snakes.  While I do not actively hunt for these snakes, I
immediately take the necessary action to terminate any found in the
vacinity of the house.  

There have only been two killed in the 17 years I have been here.  The
first was way back in 1980.  It was  6 feet long with the diameter at
least of my arm.  The second a few years later was about 4 feet.  

One that got away I discovered just last year about 4 feet from me as
I was opening the garage door.  It was about 4 feet long and coiled
and rattling in the attack mood.  As it happened I was in the act of
opening the door which pivoting about its hindge came between the
snake and me just in the nick of time.  It hit the door.  Being
uncoiled it retreated into the garage under the rear part of the car
where it recoiled.  I had only a rake handy and my effort to drag it
out where I could hit a telling blow was unsuccessful,  It scurried
under the car and from there made it to the crawl space under my
office which is attached to the garage.  I kept an anxious eye for the
remainder of the summer whenever I entered th garage, but I never saw
it again.  

I' m sort of surprised that your snake stayed in the same place for
the time you described.  Perhaps It had just ate a rat or other large
critter and was in a stuper while digesting the meal, or maybe it was
a cold afternoon.   

I think my policy of killing snakes found around the house is fully
justified by the danger they present.  Also in my area, the South
Texas thornbush country,  the specie is certainly in no danger of
extinction.


                                                                    H.