We had a little fun last night. I was working on my computer and my dog Bodhi was barking up a fit outside. I've kind of learned to ignore his barking because he often barks at cows and coyotes that he can hear over the next hill. We moved from the city to a ranch in the country about eight months ago.

My wife went out to see what was going on. She yelled "Eric get out here" so I went out to see what's going on. When I get out of the house Janet says that Bodhi has a rattlesnake at bay. The dog is going nuts but after I yell at him several times he retreats into the house.

Now we've got this snake about 20 feet from the house and we have to decide what to do with it. We concluded that snakes have their place, after all they help keep rodents at bay, but the snake's place wasn't in my front yard. So rather than just killing it we decided to relocate it.

I grabbed a large fish net used designed for koi and pinned the snake under the net. It took a few minutes to decide how to move the snake - we decide to put it in a cooler. So Janet heads towards the shop to get a cooler.

At about this point a bunch of coyotes started howling. They were close - we decided that they were probably down near out gate. I wasn't too concerned about them but I figured it's not a bad idea to have a gun on hand so I go back and grab my AK.

Janet shows up with the cooler and after a bit we manage to get the snake into the net and the net into the cooler. I closed the cooler up and Janet with my AK-47, me, Bodhi, and the snake hopped into my truck.

We headed up the road a bit and found a good place to dump the snake. I figure that the safest way to do this is to get into the bed of my truck, open the lid of my cooler and dump the snake to the ground below. No doubt the snake will be happy to head for the bushes.

I dump the snake but to my surprise rather than crawling off the snake just curls up and waits for me. I guess that it wasn't in a very good mood at that point. It was a pretty good sized snake too - probably 36-40" long.

I figure that at this point discretion is the better part of valor and hop off the side of the bed and into the truck.

Rattlesnakes in the front yard, coyotes at the end of the driveway - what more can a guy ask for? I love the country. I think I'm going to start carrying a flashlight when I go outside after dark though.

A wise move. Also, tall thick boots. If struck, be sure to inspect your boots for lodged fangs in them. They can poke you later and Yes, the venom can still be potent!

I knew a guy that died because of that...

Man, that's serious stuff. I've got some heavy boots but I normally just wear then when I'm hiking out back.

Here's some more "fun in the country." Bodhi was out back again but had been almost too quiet. We noticed three cats sitting silently looking at the slightly opened sliding back door and decided to investigate. As soon as we stepped out back we were hit by the smell of skunk.

Yea, you guessed it. Bodie was inside for just long enough to stink our house up before we dragged him to the side of the house and turned the hose and doggie shampoo on him. For a change he actually seemed to enjoy being hit in the face with a full stream of water.

Let's hope he's one of those dogs that learns the first time.

Hey Eric.

I love the eyes of your Dog!

Brown and Blue !

Thanks! He's a great dog except for a tendency to want to chase cows and roll in cow poop.

Oh, I just remembered one other thing that we've experienced out here that I never had happen when I live in the city. About a half dozen times now we've found scorpions strolling through the house. It's all very entertaining but life here has thrown some new challenges at us.

Sure beats the heck out of any story surrounding the stray kitten we took in last night. I keep telling the kids "No more animals!" Two dogs, 2 cats, 2 guinea pigs, and 1 rabbit later; looks like I'm still a softy for critters.

We also love the wildlife that comes with the setting. We have a lot of CA's (Critter Alerts); and learn a lot about the local fauna by inspecting the LDT's (Little Dead Things) found roadside.

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Yea, I've been just talking about the dangerous critters. We've had tree frogs in the house, geckos all over the place, herons, ducks, of course cattle. Janet has set up a page with some critter photos at http://web.mac.com/janetch/Tiki_Acre..._Views%5D.html

Beautiful. Out of curiousity Eric, where do you live (I don't even know what continent, but I assume North America)?

We live right next to the Mentor Marsh (any relationship ?), a state nature preserve just east of Cleveland, Ohio. I didn't take this picture, but it could sure be my backyard in the winter. We get a fair amount of critters, considering much of the area is suburbia. We had a pair of female turkeys with their young walking through the front yard a few weeks ago. No rattlers around here, but we regularly get black rat snakes and ribbon snakes.

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Very nice, but a little bit colder in the winter time than we get I'd imagine. We are located in Central Texas. Here's a satellite picture of our place:

http://maps.google.com/?sll=29.925,-...&spn=0.05,0.05

Hi, Yep, fun out in the country. I live in Northern Rhode Island. Not so many snakes,
lots of crows, a few owls, hawks and cowflop bingo. Yes, folks. If you have a fund (fun)
raiser, try cowflop bingo. It's an honest game. We lime off a grid in a small pasture, and assign random numbers to the squares. Our special bovine selectomatic waits for nature's call and "selects" the next number. It is a leisurely game. Participants buy a bingo card
and are informed if they win. Now....that's country.

Best regards, Dan

Just be sure to bet on northerly or southerly squares, according to the other thread!

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Todd (Bowie, MD, US, North America, Earth, Sol System, Vega region, Local Bubble, Orion arm, Milky Way Galaxy, Local Group, Virgo A Cluster, Virgo supercluster, the universe in which spock is clean shaven)

Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum sonatur.

personal page: http://blog.astrosketches.info

Hi, It's a tough game to get an edge. They are all random numbers .
Still,.......have you ever known such excitement?
Dan

On a recent 'country' excursion into the Sierra foothills, had to stop the car at night to find the source of a weird noise that suddenly seemed to emanate from the engine compartment. As I opened the door, I realized it was the chorus of a gazillion roadside crickets! A bonus was looking up to see a clear dark sky illuminated by...well, you know very well!

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Hi,

Good viewing out there.

Dan

I keep CCI shotshells for all my handguns,they make 'em in .22 caliber also,but I think the .22 LR is just too wimpy for a big rattler,tho the .22 Mag works fine,even from my NAA Mini.

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"An armed man is a citizen
An unarmed man is a subject"

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In retrospect, I'm kind of thinking that next time around I probably don't want to go relocating the rattler. It's not like they are an endangers species and I hear that they can be tasty.

The reason that we never did: You would feel awful guilty if it came back and bit family or dog.

I've seen it happen.

I have 2.5 acres with 1/2 acre fenced for the dogs.Any rattler inside of that is dead,but outside of the fence I leave 'em alone.
Don't fry 'em,too greasy,grilling's better

Neverfly,most dogs can survive a rattler bite with antibiotics & steroids as long as they don't get bitten right in the face,almost all my neighbors & us have had dogs get snakebit.

__________________
"An armed man is a citizen
An unarmed man is a subject"

Robert A. Heinlein

I never claimed that all bite victims die.

Besides, dogs are the most susceptible for getting bitten in the face because it's the first thing that they stick out.

There is a two shot series of anti-rattlesnake venom vaccine that you can get. We inoculated Bodhi. It's not supposed to make them snake proof, but it should make them much less susceptible to the effects of the bite. I've seen dogs in our vet's office that have been snake bit and it's not pretty.

Grill 'em, huh? How do you clean a snake?

With a Hose of course!

Didn't say you did,I was just mentioning it.

__________________
"An armed man is a citizen
An unarmed man is a subject"

Robert A. Heinlein

I didn't say that you did say I claimed it.
I was just menti... Oh nevermind