Rattlesnakes

Torvy · Mar 7, 2023

Spike56 said:
Big believer in road runners. We used to have many, but do not see many anymore. Wish I could get Parks and Wildlife or some organization to repopulate them. Unsure if its coyotes or fireants or why there is not many around anymore.

I saw one just outside of the nearest town on Saturday. I've noticed them a couple of times lately. I didn't realize they were even in East Texas. Maybe we can start a program to increase the population.

dmccarty · Mar 7, 2023

MTGreen said:
From my time in Southeastern Arizona where snakes and rattlesnakes especially are extremely common, people make what's called a snake wall which is basically a 18-24" rock wall all the way around the yard play area starting and ending at the house. It's usually made out of the local rock with vertical sides and mortar in between. There are typically several places where there are a couple of steep steps cut in so you can walk over but not compromise the effectiveness of the wall. The snakes can't climb the wall and you can generally make a snake free area for the kids. It works pretty well so long as you intelligently plan for drainage and the area is not so big that you can't check for animal holes periodically.
....

I suspect the wall works for poisonous snakes. As a kid I spent quite a bit of time looking at the snake enclosure at Gator Land. The enclosure was a wall, I think made from stucco and cinder blocks, maybe 3 feet tall. I remember having to use the steps they had to see over the wall.

Always wanted to take my kids to Gator Land but we never had the chance.

The snakes certainly did not climb out of that enclosure.

However, I have see a black snake climb a brick wall, move horizontally across that brick wall, and somehow climb up and off the roof. Danged thing was a Ninja.

I have not see a Rattlesnake on our place but we do have Copperheads. I hope the Turkeys and other critters keep the poisonous snake population down. I think I have seen more Black snakes than Copperheads and that is a good thing. I was walking to the tractor one day and hear a rattle. I stopped dead in my tracks for I did not want to be dead.

Looked down, and the rattler was a Black snake that was shaking it's tail against the leaf litter.

Other than eating some of our eggs when we had Chickens, I like the Black snakes and leave them alone, even when I know they are getting into song bird nests.

scootr · Mar 7, 2023

We have a non poisonous Gopher snake here that impersonates a rattler. Similar colors and holds the tail up shaking it.
Seen lots of Roadrunners. We call them all Pedro

- I saw Pedro follow a Mama Gambrel Quail and a line of babies. He pecked a baby and it fell, he ran forward and pecked another, it fell. And so on. Then he came back and swallowed all the dead or injured babies. Easy pickins!

jjeff · Mar 7, 2023

Things I learned on various travels and places I've lived over the years, been told baby rattlers are more dangerous cause they don't have much of a rattle, and can't control there venom injection like adults, snakes are foragers and aren't territorial, Alaska and Hawaii does not have a viable snake population if any. When I moved a 50' mobile home off my property and tore down it's water logged rotten porch the snake population exploded for some time that was also when I noticed birds of prey circling overhead on the hillside. Interesting thread because of my terrible dislike of all snakes.

deserteagle71 · Mar 7, 2023

dmccarty said:
However, I have see a black snake climb a brick wall, move horizontally across that brick wall, and somehow climb up and off the roof. Danged thing was a Ninja.

They are acrobatic. Here's a gopher snake weaving its way through chain link fencing 10' high because there was a bird's nest in a little cranny at the top.