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#1
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Gators, sharks, snakes and rays
On Sep 22, 8:06*am, (Richard Casady)
wrote: On Tue, 22 Sep 2009 00:37:08 -0400, wrote: On Mon, 21 Sep 2009 20:49:48 -0500, thunder wrote: On Mon, 21 Sep 2009 21:01:18 -0400, gfretwell wrote: The pythons are so bad in the everglades they have opened up hunting for them. No closed season, no bag limit and no restriction on how you take them. My son in law works for water management and the guy they have taking them uses a shotgun. The trick is being far enough away that when you hit one in the part that is exposed, he can't get you when he strikes back. It is certainly not a "single shot" shotgun sort of thing. You need a quick follow up shot to hit him in the head on that strike. It is sort of a "station 8 low house" sort of thing but a "double". There are teams that capture them alive but they are not your average people and they do get bit a lot. The bites are very likely to get infected. I am going to get out there with the water management folks the first time I get a chance but I will be a shotgun guy, not a "grab'm" guy. (at least not at first) I might want to go out with a capture team once I get a feel for it. I don't mind wrestling with critters. Looks like you have a new python, besides the Burmese one. http://www.miamiherald.com/573/story/1243680.html I'm still amazed those things will tangle with an alligator. *I was doing a little reading on the pythons. *It seems they could really do some damage on the Everglades ecosystem. *That's a shame. *There isn't any place like the Everglades. I was flipping channels tonight and saw that Jackass guy playing with two anacondas in one of those ball houses the kids play in. One of the snakes disappeared in those balls and popped out of nowhere to grab one of the guys by the leg. The Jackass guy got two nasty bites on his arm trying to hold one. He had it too far from the head (maybe on purpose, considering who it was). I am thinking the shotgun doesn't sound like a bad idea. I am not looking for aT The internet should disclose some makers of western boots. Might be good money in the skins Casady As all the grandkids of my parents got older, at Easter, the kid's would hide the eggs and the adults would look for em. My sis in law was bending over to pick up an egg and a hognose snake "struck" at her. She fainted right there on the spot and so did the snake. You could roll the snake on his belly and he'd roll back over like he's trying to say, 'Go away, I'm dead", sorta cute. Another time, we were exploring the pit at Falling Waters State Park mapping the cave at the bottom and one of the guys finds a black racer in the pit and decides to "rescue" it even though tit looked very happy to me down there. He caught it and stuffed it into his pack and started up the rope. He gets about halfway up and that snake got out of his pack and starts wrapping round his arm biting him and he's desperately trying to stuff it back in with one hand, funny as hell. |
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#2
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Gators, sharks, snakes and rays
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#3
posted to rec.boats
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Gators, sharks, snakes and rays
wrote in message
news  On Mon, 21 Sep 2009 08:10:43 -0700 (PDT), Frogwatch wrote: Most of us have sharks in the back of our minds whenever we swim in salt water but as attacks are rare we ignore it unless we actually see sharks. I have often seen sharks in the water after I have gotten out. The best I can suggest is to not swim if you see em and not to swim after dark or dusk when they supposedly feed most. Do not swim near bloody bait either. Fear of gators is very similar to fear of sharks. The dang lizards are just too common being in every puddle in these parts. When I was a kid they were much more rare and we would not hesitate in any body of water but these days their population has exploded and I would not go near some bodies of water I used to swim in. Some places are just too "gatorish". You do not swim near the edges of lakes with thick weeds and look out for gators and gator signs. You know they are there but you gotta figure they are scared. If you go out on the water at night and use a light, you can see their eyes glowing red and you'll be amazed how many there are. My brother could "grunt up gators" meaning he could make a noise deep in his throat to call them. Snakes oughta be more worrisome than gators or sharks cuz there's so many of em. Every palmetto thicket probably has at least one rattlesnake but as long as you dont walk through the palmettos, you seem almost safe. Its the Cottonmouth Moccasins that scare me the most. Ugly, evil looking and aggressive, they'll fight you for a fish you catch and they are all over the place. My neighbor has em in his yard and they crawl into his garage from the creek behind his house. All the trompin in the woods near bodies of water we do nobody in my family has been bitten but our dog got bit on her face. She swelled up like a balloon and died within 15 minutes. My earliest remembered boating experience (I was 4) was in a canoe with my mother behind me. A Moccasin charged the boat and tried to climb in and she swung that paddle like an axe decapitating the snake right beside me, sorta made an impression. Sting rays are not normally fatal when they hit you but seriously painful and likely to get infected. My brother in law got hit on his ankle and we had to haul him 20 miles to the hospital to get the barb pulled out. People always say "Shuffle your feet" when you walk in shallow bay water to scare em off and maybe that works. When we were kids, we walked barefoot all over the bays and never got hit but as an adult I wear "water shoes" as a half assed safety measure but I doubt thye'd help. Mostly, I just try to avoid em and swim as much as I can instead of walking. I figure that if you dwell on these things you'll never ahve fun but you should take a few precautions. I was thinking about gators when you were telling the Tolman in fresh water story. One was coming after my dog last week. I managed to scare him off before he got to the dog. I saw him crawling along the bottom from the boat, jumped in the water next to the dog and off he went. I am not as sure about the snakes. I am out in the scrub park near the house quite a bit and I have never seen a rattlesnake. There are plenty of black snakes and a few coachwhips there. This may be why http://gfretwell.com/wildlife/Blacksnake1.jpg http://gfretwell.com/wildlife/Blacksnake2.jpg http://gfretwell.com/wildlife/Blacksnake3.jpg http://gfretwell.com/wildlife/Blacksnake4.jpg http://gfretwell.com/wildlife/Blacksnake5.jpg http://gfretwell.com/wildlife/Blacksnake6.jpg http://gfretwell.com/wildlife/Blacksnake7.jpg I took a stingray barb in the foot once on the beach on Sanibel but it wasn't a bad shot. He poked up the barb to say "I'm sleeping here" and I was walking carefully so it only went in about 1/2" I picked open the wound with a fruit pick from the barmaid at the Hilton (now the Sanibel Inn) beach bar and flushed it out with vodka. I was fine. I have stepped on sand burrs that hurt longer but they are harder to get out. Are the black snakes poisonous? -- Nom=de=Plume |
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#4
posted to rec.boats
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Gators, sharks, snakes and rays
On Mon, 21 Sep 2009 12:06:54 -0700, "nom=de=plume"
wrote: Are the black snakes poisonous? There are no poisonous snakes. They are all safe to eat. Some are venomous, but not blacksnakes. Casady |
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#5
posted to rec.boats
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Gators, sharks, snakes and rays
"Richard Casady" wrote in message
... On Mon, 21 Sep 2009 12:06:54 -0700, "nom=de=plume" wrote: Are the black snakes poisonous? There are no poisonous snakes. They are all safe to eat. Some are venomous, but not blacksnakes. Casady I meant venomous. Thanks for the correction. I've never had a problem with snakes (non-human of course). I don't even mind spiders. I had a friend with a tarantula. I wouldn't have picked it as a pet, but it was ok to handle (after a few thoughtful minutes of consideration). -- Nom=de=Plume |
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#7
posted to rec.boats
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Gators, sharks, snakes and rays
On Mon, 21 Sep 2009 16:37:09 -0400, wrote:
On Mon, 21 Sep 2009 12:06:54 -0700, "nom=de=plume" wrote: Are the black snakes poisonous? No they are really quite harmless to anything they can't swallow. They have tiny teeth that barely break the skin on a soft spot like the inside of your arm and don't hurt my fingers at all. I had one living in my screen cage for a couple weeks and they are always around the yard. I still get one in now and then. It sure did a good job on the bugs, lizards and tree frogs.That's how I know I have one. Nothing is alive in there. http://gfretwell.com/wildlife/Black%20racer.jpg http://gfretwell.com/wildlife/Black%20racer2.jpg http://gfretwell.com/wildlife/Black%20racer3.jpg I am the local snake wrangler and I go get them out of other's peoples pool cages and garages a lot. I toss them in my yard if I can't talk them into keeping them at in their yard. I suppose it takes them about an hour to make their way back but I tried ;-) The black snake in the picture sequence is a racer? King snakes are famously known for eating rattlesnakes, too, since apparently they are immune to rattlesnake venom. When I was a kid, when I would come across a racer, I would try to chase it down. It was like a sport, since the racers were so fast. I never did see a black one, though. The ones I've encountered in our area have been blue or green. -- Posted via NewsDemon.com - Premium Uncensored Newsgroup Service -------http://www.NewsDemon.com------ Unlimited Access, Anonymous Accounts, Uncensored Broadband Access |
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#8
posted to rec.boats
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Gators, sharks, snakes and rays
On Tue, 22 Sep 2009 00:28:59 -0400, wrote:
On Mon, 21 Sep 2009 20:21:13 -0500, wrote: On Mon, 21 Sep 2009 16:37:09 -0400, wrote: On Mon, 21 Sep 2009 12:06:54 -0700, "nom=de=plume" wrote: Are the black snakes poisonous? No they are really quite harmless to anything they can't swallow. They have tiny teeth that barely break the skin on a soft spot like the inside of your arm and don't hurt my fingers at all. I had one living in my screen cage for a couple weeks and they are always around the yard. I still get one in now and then. It sure did a good job on the bugs, lizards and tree frogs.That's how I know I have one. Nothing is alive in there. http://gfretwell.com/wildlife/Black%20racer.jpg http://gfretwell.com/wildlife/Black%20racer2.jpg http://gfretwell.com/wildlife/Black%20racer3.jpg I am the local snake wrangler and I go get them out of other's peoples pool cages and garages a lot. I toss them in my yard if I can't talk them into keeping them at in their yard. I suppose it takes them about an hour to make their way back but I tried ;-) The black snake in the picture sequence is a racer? King snakes are famously known for eating rattlesnakes, too, since apparently they are immune to rattlesnake venom. When I was a kid, when I would come across a racer, I would try to chase it down. It was like a sport, since the racers were so fast. I never did see a black one, though. The ones I've encountered in our area have been blue or green. The southern black racer is more closely related to the northern black snake from what I understand. They may even be the same crtitter with environmental adaptation. That's interesting. The black snake in this area is rather gentle. The old farmers in the area wouldn't mind the black snakes in their barns or in the corn cribs because the snakes would eat the rats. I remember having a black snake as a pet when I was a kid. A person could handle it without a worry. -- Posted via NewsDemon.com - Premium Uncensored Newsgroup Service -------http://www.NewsDemon.com------ Unlimited Access, Anonymous Accounts, Uncensored Broadband Access |
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#9
posted to rec.boats
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Gators, sharks, snakes and rays
On Tue, 22 Sep 2009 02:21:55 -0400, wrote:
On Tue, 22 Sep 2009 00:28:38 -0500, wrote: The black snake in the picture sequence is a racer? King snakes are famously known for eating rattlesnakes, too, since apparently they are immune to rattlesnake venom. When I was a kid, when I would come across a racer, I would try to chase it down. It was like a sport, since the racers were so fast. I never did see a black one, though. The ones I've encountered in our area have been blue or green. The southern black racer is more closely related to the northern black snake from what I understand. They may even be the same crtitter with environmental adaptation. That's interesting. The black snake in this area is rather gentle. The old farmers in the area wouldn't mind the black snakes in their barns or in the corn cribs because the snakes would eat the rats. I remember having a black snake as a pet when I was a kid. A person could handle it without a worry. The southern black racers are pretty aggressive. They won't hurt you but they put on quite a show. They really don't like being picked up. It is quite a show when I pull one out of someone's pool cage. I let them go nuts striking at everything until I get it outside because I know it won't hurt me. They do put a nasty stink on your hands. That is some protective reaction I imagine. As soon as they hit the ground they are gone. The flip side of that is if they are really attacked they will roll up in a ball with nothing but the tail sticking out, whipping around, trying to look like a rattle. My dog went after one and he rolled up like a hockey puck. I picked him up and tossed out the door. Once it was clear it opened up and rocketed away unharmed. That sounds typical of the behavior of the Hognose snake (or Puff Adder) in this area. It will spread the sides of its head like a cobra, and it puts on quite a show. It acts ill-tempered and will strike. But the thing is harmless. When it becomes obvious that it hasn't dissuaded its 'attacker' it plays dead. It's really amusing to watch. -- Posted via NewsDemon.com - Premium Uncensored Newsgroup Service -------http://www.NewsDemon.com------ Unlimited Access, Anonymous Accounts, Uncensored Broadband Access |
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#10
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Gators, sharks, snakes and rays
On Mon, 21 Sep 2009 13:33:47 -0400, wrote:
I am not as sure about the snakes. I am out in the scrub park near the house quite a bit and I have never seen a rattlesnake. There are plenty of black snakes and a few coachwhips there. This may be why http://gfretwell.com/wildlife/Blacksnake1.jpg http://gfretwell.com/wildlife/Blacksnake2.jpg http://gfretwell.com/wildlife/Blacksnake3.jpg http://gfretwell.com/wildlife/Blacksnake4.jpg http://gfretwell.com/wildlife/Blacksnake5.jpg http://gfretwell.com/wildlife/Blacksnake6.jpg http://gfretwell.com/wildlife/Blacksnake7.jpg I took a stingray barb in the foot once on the beach on Sanibel but it wasn't a bad shot. He poked up the barb to say "I'm sleeping here" and I was walking carefully so it only went in about 1/2" I picked open the wound with a fruit pick from the barmaid at the Hilton (now the Sanibel Inn) beach bar and flushed it out with vodka. I was fine. I have stepped on sand burrs that hurt longer but they are harder to get out. Very cool. It's sure increased my respect for black snakes. -- John H |
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