More Ramblings from the
Oh, about a month ago when I was checking out a plant near our gate to the yard, I bumped into a medium size snake. He did not to be upset with me and therefore never moved, spit or anything, just looked at me. He looked like a Bull Snake except that his head was sort of shaped like that of a rattler. Not being sure I grabbed my camera and snapped a couple of shots.
I then drove down to Poco Loco our town and community center. I showed the photos around and the general consensuses was that it was a bull snake trying to imitate a rattler. This is a known practice of Bull Snakes.
I returned home and the snake was still there. When my wife Linda came home and looked she thought that his head was somewhat rattle snake looking but sort of felt that it was indeed a Bull Snake. At about ten that night I checked again and sure enough he was still there. However in the morning he had moved on.
Over the next month I encountered him again, once in the raspberries, behind the greenhouse, and a few other places. He was always sort of curled up and in no rush to go anywhere. I assumed that he was surviving on the local rodents as all my bull frogs and fish were in tact. He became a regular object around the yard (this is the area of the Solar Ranch which surrounds the house and is where we spend most of our time).
Anyway this past week Linda came looking for me at the studio and said that I had to get rid of my little friend before someone (cats, dog, or us) got bit. She explained that she found him under a tarp she just lifted and that this time she could see his collection of five rattles. So, I made myself a tool and we went down to the compost where Linda nearly touched him. Sure enough he was still there right where Linda left him, so I looped my new tool over his head and tightened up on it. I than lifted him into a bucket and took him down to an out cropping of lava rocks over at the Petaca (what was at one time a raging water flow, strong enough to carve a mini gorge that is a couple hundred feet across before man took all its water). I released him and he started to slither away but stopped and came back toward me. He got about half a foot from me and stopped. At that point I talked with him and wished him well, explaining that because of the venom which he possessed that at $40g’s a bite and with no medical coverage, that it was just too risky and that it would be better for him to hang out at the Petaca.
Over the years we have had several small Bull Snakes, Gardner Snakes, and some very large Bull Snakes visit our yard. But this is the first Rattler and I hope the last. I have since learned that our rattler is known as a Desert Sand Rattler and they don’t get much bigger than about 2 feet. Evidently they are not as aggressive as their bigger cousins the Diamond Backs.
Terry R. Wolff
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