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View Full Version : "Rattlesnake memories", anyone?



Chukarman
06-30-2006, 01:20 PM
I'm sure that each and everyone of us have some kind of memories in regard to rattlesnakes, so I decided to bring up the subject and see who's got the funniest story of them all.
Cheers :mrgreen:

Tuffcity
06-30-2006, 06:22 PM
Many years ago I worked for BC Parks in Vernon. At that time there was a bio that was doing a study of some sort on rattlesnakes in the Cosens Bay (Kal Lake Park) area that involved capturing and marking snakes. He asked me to keep an eye out and catch any that I found.

Anyway, one evening I was down near the beach and a fairly good sized one started buzzing away so I grabbed my snake stick (which was a steel rod with a square 'U' bent into it at the bottom) and wrangled it into a bag and at the end of my shift I took it home as I wasn't returning to Park HQ until the morning.

The snake was dumped into an old aquarium in the dining room and a piece of plywood was put on top, held down with a brick. My room mate had an unholy fear of poisonous creatures and was extremely concerned that escape was imminent and he would be the first to die in his sleep. When he retired to his room I could hear him stuffing towels under the crack in the door, just in case... :)

RC

mtnmax
06-30-2006, 07:48 PM
Lets just start by saying I do not like snakes. Hate is a good word for my fear of them.
About the age of 16 or 17 I spent my time in the Muskoka area of Ontario. The Mississauga rattler is known in those parts. One spring my buddy and I wondered down to the dock at the cottage ( on the Trent Severn Waterway) to lift the small boat that was upside down on the end of the dock. With a big grunt we lifted it in the air and just as fast I put that boat back down and ran up the 50' cliff of stairs. From what I was told there was some schrieking coming from my direction. That snake was coiled up under the boat and it had about a 2" girth on him. As it turned out it was only a rat snake witch looks exactly like the rattler but no venom. To me it did not matter I just wanted it dead.
Everyone is afraid of something and mine is snakes. Stop laughing I am not a sissy!!!!

Mtnmax

tmarschall
06-30-2006, 08:03 PM
You would think that 40 plus years of roaming the hills of central Texas would give you many encounters with rattlebugs(ratlesnakes). The one time, and only one time to this date, that I have ever ran across one, had some unusual circumstances. I was in the army stationed at Ft Hood in central Texas at the time, it was bow season. The training areas are open to hunters when the troops are not using them. During bow season, you can hunt an area, maybe 1,000 acres, without any restrictions. Several people may hunt an area at the same time. I had been hunting a particular area where I had seen some good buck sign. One day during lunch at the Rod and Gun Club. I met another hunter who had been hunting the same general area. We compared notes on what we had seen and where. He mentioned all the snakes he had run across in the area. Three or four every time he goes out, some of them rattle snakes!! I told him I had not seen one in the many times I had been in the area. He said, "It's not surprising, you see, I am a jinx when it comes to snakes. If there is a snake within a mile, it will hunt me down and I will see it!!" I laughed and said, "If you say so." That afternoon upon returning from that hunting area, just as I was leaving, there was a rattlesnake laying in the middle of the road. The first rattlesnake I had ever encountered in the wild. His "JINX" had passed on to me for that one day. I have never seen a rattlesnake since then, that was 20 years ago.

Speaking of poisonous snakes though, my wife did find a 20 inch coral snake in the road last week while taking a walk in the neighborhood, fortunately already dead!!

Dano
06-30-2006, 11:02 PM
When I was about 22, my father and his buddy took me up to an area just outside Cache Creek (towards Kamloops) for some chukar hunting.
We pushed up a flock and then had to chase them as they ran up towards the bottom of the cliff. We shot a couple and then I heard dad's buddy yelling and then he shot, then he yelled at his dog "NOOOO". I called over to see what Ian had shot and he told me his dog almost picked up a rattler but he called him off and shot the top half of the snakes head off. I hurried over to check it out and it was small, maybe 2 feet with a small rattle. I asked Ian if he wanted the rattle and he said no so I pulled out my knife and began to cut. The snake twitched and I jumped back,.... and of course my dad and Ian started to laugh their heads off! Dad said, "You idiot, it doesn't have the part of it's head that had the fangs!"
Pretty funny at the time and it still makes me smile to think about it. Had that rattle a long time but it didn't survive my kids "Show and Tell" at elementry school....
Dano

Farmer
07-01-2006, 04:53 PM
When I was 10 we camped along the Ashnola River. My brother and I were wandering all over the place along the river, through the bush and long grass. Walking down the grassy road back to camp, there was a snake at the edge of the road. It coiled and started to rattle. I ran the 50 yards to the camp and got the .22. How I hit the snake in the head while shaking so bad, I don't know. I still have the rattles 36 years later. Anyway we were sleeping in a tent that night. Well I should say laying in a tent with snakes on the brain. Something was in the tent. The light comes on and dad says stop dreaming and go to sleep. Until the deer mouse with cold feet ran across his neck. Needless to say, it was a long night! I haven't seen one since, which is fine as far as I am concerned

Gord

guntech
07-01-2006, 06:08 PM
Back in 1966-67 I was going to gunsmithing college in Trinidad, Colorado. A friend from New York State and myself took a couple of days off and went on a couple of organized rattlesnake hunts in Oklahoma and Texas. It was interesting.

The most interesting part came when we decided we wanted to take a live snake back to New York to show his brother on our spring break. First we were going to come up to Calgary and then over to NY and then back to Colorado. It was going to be a 5000 mile trip. We had to keep the snake in the college dorm for a week before the trip.

We did it in my 66 MGB soft top. We had a nice size snake in a zippered XP100 (Fireball) case. It was a cold spring break through Wyoming, Montana and Alberta. We kept as much heat as we could on the cased snake on the passenger side. The MGB was a cold sucker... We stopped in Alberta for a day, showed the snake to a friend, packed it up again and headed for NY. In NY just my friends brother was at home. We shut the doors to the kitchen, got a couple of snake sticks out and dumped it on the kitchen floor. His brother got on the top of the table. We had a good laugh about it all and then took the snake outside and cut it's head off and skinned it.

The meat was cut into about 3 inch pieces and we fried it up. It twitches a bit at first in the pan... looks pretty weird.

Tastes fairly bland, a bit like chicken.

Then we headed back to Colorado... 5000 miles in 10 days with only one speeding ticket in NY. Drove about 90 mph as much as we could. Did some dumb things back then - lucky to have survived that car.

Since we we not leaving anything in Canada, we did not declare anything crossing the border, and since we we not bringing anything into the US that had not already been there, we did not declare anything coming back... Can you imagine if customs had wanted to look in that Remington XP100 case to see if there was a gun there!

We had decided if it came to an inspection we would simply tell our true story and see what they would do...

Walksalot
07-02-2006, 12:54 PM
My buddy being big on relocating things as an alternative to killing them found an rattlesnake outside his house. He gets a five gallon bucket, puts the snake in it and then behind the front seat of his Ram Charger(blazer style) and heads to the top of the switch backs up Penticton Creek. He arrives at the top, reaches for the bucke and the bucket tipped over on the ride up. Now, where is the little bugger. After a cautious search of his SUV he finds it curled up under the drivers seat. He finally got it out ahd it went on its merry way.

Myself, I fished Penticton Creek as a youngster and more than once I had to jump over one as they can't be heard above the roar of the creek.

I also had one scoot infront of a horse I was riding and seen enough cowboy movies to suspect the horse was going to go ballistic. I reined the horse in but the horse did nothing. The snake effected it not at all.

Kirby
07-02-2006, 01:19 PM
I've run into a fair number over the years. stepped over a couple, and been a coule feet away from lots. Nothing really exciting about them, kinda like a bear, everybody thinks they are gonna kill ya until you deal with them a bit.

Kirby

Canuck2
07-03-2006, 03:26 PM
Right you are, Kirby - really nothing to get excited about. They'll get a little perplexed only if really pushed.

My most exciting moment was when I stepped on one. I used to visit some dens every spring and take pictures. One fine April day, I was slowly cruising along a cliff face that had cracks where they liked to sun themselves. I was watching the cracks instead of watching where I was going and stepped over a sizable boulder. Immediately a snake started buzzing and I looked down to see its rattle sticking out from under my foot and going 90 miles an hour. Fortunately the front 3/4 of the snake was under the boulder, but you should have seen my rendition of the Olympic high jump.

There's one of the photos I took at the following link:

http://www.angelfire.com/bc/canuck2/wildlife.html

John, my cousins fished Penticton Creek frequently. One time their black lab got bit up there but survived. For a long time it had a wattle under its neck about the size of one you'd expect on a moose.

LeverActionJunkie
07-03-2006, 03:58 PM
Hunting Chukars along Kamloops Lake One fall, my buddys Brittnay was doing an awsome job pinnging them birds down. We weren't exactly keeping up our end of the deal but we had bagged a couple of birds. Then Cleo started getting birdy and we were slowly making our way over to her, waiting till she went on point. It wasn't long till she locked up on a couple birds, she was always so intense on point she wouldn't move a muscle. This time however she kept side stepping a bit every couple seconds to the left and the right. This was aggravating my buddy, so I let him walk upon her. " What the hell is wrong with you you damn mongrel .....WHOA WHAT THE F$%@!" He then yanked the dog back by the collar and let both barrels off into the hillside. As he described it Cleo had a Chukar pinned about 18" from her nose, and a Rattle Sanke coiled up about 10" from her nose. Obviously the reason for her nervousness.

huntwriter
07-05-2006, 10:48 PM
Me and snakes do not get along very well. Let’s call it what it is – I have a phobia of these critter. Many years ago I hunted with some friends in Alabama, I drilled a nice fat corn fed doe and now had the job to blood trail her in ankle deep leaf litter. The only way one can do that is on hands and knees with the nose close to the ground and the rattlesnakes. Not one of my favorite positions to be in with rattlesnakes around.

My friend knew about my dislike for snakes and shares it with me. However he does like products made of rattlesnake, like snake boots and a rattle on his key chain. As we searched for the blood trail - which has faded out into small droplets – my mind was occupied with finding blood drops in ankle deep leaf litter. Right behind me I heard a distinct rattle from an angry snake. In a split second I turned around - and almost soiled my pants at the same time – with the rifle ready to whack it over the snakes head.

What relive when I saw my friend with his stupid rattle key hanger in the hand and a big silly grin on his face. Not a story about a real rattlesnake encounters but as close as it will get, for me anyway.

bsa30-06
07-06-2006, 03:54 PM
huntwriter, i couldn't agree more i hate snakes, and if the day comes when i come across one it better move fast in the other direction, or it is going to get shot!!!

Walksalot
07-06-2006, 07:41 PM
I go through the paper and cut out all the pictures of snakes I see as my wife is very afraid of them. If she is reading a book and it flies across the room I know there was a picture of a snake in it. A friend on a lark threw a rubber snake at her and after she had a panic attack he didn't find it very amusing.
We all have our fears and we deal with them as best we can.

elkster
07-08-2006, 08:35 PM
Not a story about a live snake, but still good for a chuckle. A few years ago me and golfing partner were playing outside of Vernon. My partner is deathly afraid of snakes any kind, any size. well coming up the fairway I found a snake that had been hit by the mower, I put it in my golf towel and while I was pulling the flag, I coiled it in the hole. When my partner went to get his ball, he jumped about six feet in the air and was off the green in a flash. I was laughing so hard, I couldn't run away and I thought he was going to kill me. We still chuckle about

JaegerMeister
07-19-2006, 12:50 PM
Come to think of it, 5 years ago I was down in Idaho near Brownlee and hooked up with an old friend for Chukar hunting. My dog was on point and just before the covey flushed, I noticed a rattler 3 ft away from my dog's nose. Make the long story short, I killed the rattler with my stock and the covie flushed away unharmed.

troutseeker
08-01-2006, 12:28 AM
Funny that I read this tonight as I was fly fishing in the Similkameen river this afternoon and saw one half in the water half on land with a fish stuck in it's mouth... I had seen rattlers before, but never one that "fished". He was worried about me but not about to let go of it's prey. We both went our separate ways. I did better than him, catchin four trout (but keeping none, so I guess he did better than me...).

Troutseeker

Rainwater
08-01-2006, 11:12 AM
Hockey stick and a garbage can are all you need, move 'em back up the mountain and let them keep their rattles. Too many rattlesnake stories to list here and have never been bit yet. 7 at my house last year. All relocated.