Snakes!

[patrickg]

Yes, times change and the okld ways and speach patterns drift over time.

My mom is 85 as of her last birthday and was born on a farm near Bray, OK (near Marlow) Grew up farming, helped her dad raise most of what they ate. They never had a tractor, plowed with a pair of horses. Mom had dark red hair and often joked that it got that way from swimming in the red water of the farm PONDS. Maybe the younger generation you represent took on a Texan afectation and call ponds, tanks.

Patrick

 

[TresCrows]

It is not the numbers of mice the snake eats that make the difference but the numbers of mice that will not be born as a result. A few predators including snakes can be a good thing. Too bad they don't eat deer. J

 

[Bird]

<font color=blue>near Bray, OK (near Marlow)</font color=blue>

Made me have to get my map out and look at it. We moved from Marlow in June '56 (only lived there a couple of years) and I didn't remember Bray. And my mother's only 81./w3tcompact/icons/wink.gif

 

[patrickg]

Bird, I double checked with mom and she says she doesn't recall ayone calling a pond a tank when she was on the farm but she has heard some Texans call then tanks. She left the farm in about 1936 and worked in Marlow and then Duncan.

Gee, Bird, we are almost kin, if not by blood at least by virtue of our parents eating the same dirt.

I'm not surprised you don't remember Bray, it isn't much. One of its claims to fame is that Gene Autry's wife (a school mate of my mom) was from there.

When My mom's dad hitched up the team and took the family to town to shop, it was Marlow.

See ya, cuz. I gotta go deport/release Rocky Racoon #3

Patrick

 

[MossRoad]

Technically, they are venomous. But no more venomous than garter snakes or human saliva if injected into the blood stream. Read this, it is very interesting. <A target="_blank" HREF=http://www.hognose.com/pages/venomous.htm> http://www.hognose.com/pages/venomous.htm </A>

And be sure to go back up to <A target="_blank" HREF=http://www.hognose.com>www.hognose.com </A>to see a great website dedicated to these fine snakes.

 

[LTEnterprises]

if they are non piosonus they will keep the poisonus snakes away--i leave the NP snakes alone

 

[mbsil]

My $.02:

1. "The Pond" refers to the Atlantic ocean! (so the Brits say!)
"Hopping the Pond" = Crossing the Atlantic

2. All snakes must die!

Adam and Eve (mainly that lyin hussie Eve) were deceived
by a snake. It wasn't a badger, ferret, parrot or
hummingbird, so I believe that God is trying to tell us that
snakes are inherently evil! God wasn't big on pigs either.
He made them, but he didn't say that we had to eat them.

Poisonous? Non-poisonus? Kill 'em all, let God sort 'em out!

If mice are a problem, get a cat!

 

[DVerbarg]

<font color=blue>2. All snakes must die!</font color=blue>

Not all snakes, just the ones in my yard!

 

[patrickg]

MossRoad, You may have heard the old tale about how aerodynamicists were sure that a bumblebee couldn't sustain flight but the bumble bee not being an aerodynamicist flew just fine.

A lot of information. I read it all, some of it twice and came away with these three points that I think are important:

1. Enlarged teeth may also facilitate the injection of a toxic substance into a prey item for the purpose of subduing it prior to ingestion.

2. Then, if keepers use safe handling procedures and use tongs to feed their charges, the likelihood of a stupid feeding error (SFE) and envenomation can be greatly reduced.

3. Those with increased sensitivity and/or other immunological problems should take extra precautions and not tempt fate.

Since I have never met the guy who my friend described as being bitten, envenomated, and subsequently suffered the effects to the extent of going to the hospital, I can't comment on his "sensitivity." I can comment on his being bitten. It wasn't a SFE, but in my opinion it was stupid to stick his thumb in a snakes mouth and let it chew on it for a while. He reportedly thought it was cute that this little "harmless" snake would try to bite him. Hadn't this guy learned anything from Seymor ("Little Shop of Horrors")?

I'm sure there is now one more citizen who believes the Hog Nose is poisonous, irrespective of the opinions of others.

You and I may debate the number of angels dancing on the head of a pin but that citizen counted them. When empirical data is at odds with opinion or theory, I tend to side with the data until given good reason to alter my view.

Patrick

 

[MossRoad]

Hey, I'm agreeing with you. I didn't say they weren't venomous. What I said was:

<font color=blue>Technically, they are venomous. But no more venomous than garter snakes or human saliva if injected into the blood stream. Read this, it is very interesting</font color=blue>.

The article that I linked to agreed with your position.