# Snakes and Other Dangers



## Meerkat (May 31, 2011)

Hubby was out do some minor work on the jon boat.I told him to watch out for snakes hideing under the shed in all that junk he stored over the years.

Told him to roll up his britches in his socks so a snake could'nt crawl up there and bit him 15 times before he could get it out.

Now he's affraid to work on boat,he is affraid of snakes. I respect them but don't have that kind of fear.Just the thought of one runnign up his legs was horrifing to him.

I grew up in Stone Mountain Ga with snakes and swam with them in our 10 acre lake.Snakes kill rats and other varmits too.He grew up at the beach in SCarolina.

What wildlife do you have to look out for where you live?


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## TheAnt (Jun 7, 2011)

Yeah, I can see how the thought scared him. I dont care for snakes. Here we have lots of black widows, brown recluse, and scorpions too. I got stung by a little scorpion but it only numbed half my hand and a ways up my arm... I was a little worried as I had never been stung by one before. :help:


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## kejmack (May 17, 2011)

Fire ants, copperheads, coral snakes, rattle snakes, black widows, brown recluse. I turned over a feed pan the other morning and saw the biggest black widow I had ever seen. My daughter got bitten by a black widow when she was 5 and got very sick. I always shake out my shoes for scorpions. When I lived in Virginia, we had mountain lions.


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## Meerkat (May 31, 2011)

TheAnt said:


> Yeah, I can see how the thought scared him. I dont care for snakes. Here we have lots of black widows, brown recluse, and scorpions too. I got stung by a little scorpion but it only numbed half my hand and a ways up my arm... I was a little worried as I had never been stung by one before. :help:


 Brown recluse is a bad spider!They can do a lot of damage to you.I've already had 2 run across my legs this week.Slept with the lights on.Scorpions scare me more than spiders though.One crawled on my foot when I was a kid and stung the fire out of me.We have them here too but not nearly as big as the ones in Stone Mountain were.One stung me on the finger here a few years ago,it was numb for a few hours.

Some people have to deal with grizzlys ,that would be terrible for me.We have black bears here and a few panthers but no really dangerous large animals.


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## Meerkat (May 31, 2011)

kejmack said:


> Fire ants, copperheads, coral snakes, rattle snakes, black widows, brown recluse. I turned over a feed pan the other morning and saw the biggest black widow I had ever seen. My daughter got bitten by a black widow when she was 5 and got very sick. I always shake out my shoes for scorpions. When I lived in Virginia, we had mountain lions.


 FIRE ANTS! I can't stand them.They will all get on you without you knowing it, then one must signal the others to all bite you at once!.


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## kyhoti (Nov 16, 2008)

Fire ants top my list on immediate threat, as they are relentless. I have found several baby snakes of late, and while I couldn't ID them, I am close enough to water to have to worry about copperheads and water moccasins. The next most dangerous critters in my AO are of the human variety.


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## power (May 7, 2011)

I don't worry much about animals, insects, or much else. Most will not bother you if you don't bother them. Most are easily avoided. Most do more good then they do bad. And most are not able to do much permament damage.
Now people are a completely different thing.


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## lotsoflead (Jul 25, 2010)

black bears have over run the area, they always seem to go the other way, but it's just a matter of time til someone accidently gets between them and their cubs or their food.Weekends are the worst, people up in the village have to put their garbage out for monday morn pick up and it's like a smorgus board for them, some of those idiots complain if a dog in loose with no tags, but they think the bears are cute, but one day, they won't be so cute,they'll find out the difference between a cute black bear and an old yellow lab.


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## Jimmy24 (Apr 20, 2011)

Eastern Diamondback, Water Moccasin, Copperhead snakes.

Fire Ants, Cow Ants, Black Widows, Brown Recluse.

You have to pay attention for sure.

Jimmy


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## TheAnt (Jun 7, 2011)

power said:


> I don't worry much about animals, insects, or much else. Most will not bother you if you don't bother them. Most are easily avoided. Most do more good then they do bad. And most are not able to do much permament damage.
> Now people are a completely different thing.


Yes, the creepy crawlys arent so bad... its those damn vermen from down the road that you have to watch out for. Ive never had any fire ants take my stereo! Most critters I find in the house are trying to get out (poor things) and not taking my stuff with them. You have to be watchful of critters but they are much safer than the human variety for sure. Big ups!


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## power (May 7, 2011)

TheAnt said:


> Yes, the creepy crawlys arent so bad... its those damn vermen from down the road that you have to watch out for. Ive never had any fire ants take my stereo! Most critters I find in the house are trying to get out (poor things) and not taking my stuff with them. You have to be watchful of critters but they are much safer than the human variety for sure. Big ups!


People and domesticated animals are more danger than any wild animal.


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## TimB (Nov 11, 2008)

Other than spiders (Black Widows and Brown Recluse) the only other problem I have is Copperheads.  For some reason, I seem to have an ample supply in my yard. But then again, we have never had a rat or mouse problem either. :2thumb:
Meerkat, I can almost throw a rock and hit Stone Mountain from my house. :wave: Oh, and tell hubby to make a lot of racket when he's working in the yard or going into the shed. Supposedly, snakes are more afraid of us than we are of them and if given advance warning, they will leave. Spiders on the other hand...:gaah:

Tim


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## BillM (Dec 29, 2010)

*Good to*



TimB said:


> Other than spiders (Black Widows and Brown Recluse) the only other problem I have is Copperheads.  For some reason, I seem to have an ample supply in my yard. But then again, we have never had a rat or mouse problem either. :2thumb:
> Meerkat, I can almost throw a rock and hit Stone Mountain from my house. :wave: Oh, and tell hubby to make a lot of racket when he's working in the yard or going into the shed. Supposedly, snakes are more afraid of us than we are of them and if given advance warning, they will leave. Spiders on the other hand...:gaah
> 
> Tim


Copper heads are also good to eat .


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## ajsmith (Feb 1, 2010)

We have a couple types of rattle snakes (timber rattlers are the nastiest), black widows, brown recluse, cougar, black bear and one of the smallest cats with the biggest attitude, the bob cat, and the porcupine can sure make a mess of the family dog and lastly the teenager with the import car sporting the fart pipe doing 50 mph through the neighborhood.......


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## Meerkat (May 31, 2011)

TimB said:


> Other than spiders (Black Widows and Brown Recluse) the only other problem I have is Copperheads.  For some reason, I seem to have an ample supply in my yard. But then again, we have never had a rat or mouse problem either. :2thumb:
> Meerkat, I can almost throw a rock and hit Stone Mountain from my house. :wave: Oh, and tell hubby to make a lot of racket when he's working in the yard or going into the shed. Supposedly, snakes are more afraid of us than we are of them and if given advance warning, they will leave. Spiders on the other hand...:gaah:
> 
> Tim


 Hi :wave:,yes I loved growing up there in Stone Mtn.We use to watch them work on the carving when I was a kid.

And there were lots of snakes of all kinds .My mother was bitten by a rattler ,almost lost her leg from infection.

I climbed that mountain many times.Last time I visited I got lost it has changed so much,too many multi-laned highways now.Redan Rd. is nothing like it was.

Over a half century since I ran the woods of Dekalb Cty.


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## Necred (Sep 26, 2010)

*Snakes*

Yesterday riding down Ga26 with my window about 2 in down, something caught my eye & startled me, it was a 30" non posionous coachwhip trying to get in. I snapped a pic & pulled over, he crawled back under the hood. When i got to ww i attempted to pull him from my fender well, i failed. Havent seen him since, dont know if he got out in parking lot, at my daughters or back at house. I hope he cant get inside, im sure he could freak us out.


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## Bigdog57 (Oct 9, 2008)

I don't mind snakes, or gators either - this IS Florida after all.

But the BIG ground spiders top my list of things I don't like or tolerate! So far, I have killed four in the house. They don't look like Brown Recluse - bigger and the leg spread is different - they match the looks of the 'Huntsman' type better. Still, the "only good spider is a dead spider!" rule applies here. My little .22 revolver with primer-only Colibri loads makes short work of them. 
The holes in the sheetrock are barely noticible and easily fixed........ :2thumb:


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## NaeKid (Oct 17, 2008)

Meerkat said:


> What wildlife do you have to look out for where you live?


Yesterday rescued a baby-duckling that walked right up to me in my back yard. It crossed a farm-highway from a pond about a half-a-mile north of my house ...

A couple days ago had a doe (white-tail) on the side of the highway munching on grasses while I rode my motorbike by ...

I regularly meet up with bears - brown, black and grizzly - try not to make them guys unhappy. Coyotes in the backyard chasing mice and gophers is common ...


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## Sourdough (May 22, 2010)

power said:


> People and domesticated animals are more danger than any wild animal.


I'll challenge that statement. I always have a firearm, even going to the outhouse.


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## power (May 7, 2011)

Sourdough said:


> I'll challenge that statement. I always have a firearm, even going to the outhouse.


Do you know of any animal that kills as many people as other people or domesticated animals?


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## testhop (Dec 20, 2009)

IN BALTIMORE CITY its rats


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## testhop (Dec 20, 2009)

in the city we got rats boy do we have rats.
the cats give them wide birth.


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## Jason (Jul 25, 2009)

In our corner of PA we do have copperheads but I've never seen one in the wild. And I'm outside a lot-live on a farm. Once when I was in high school my parents' basset hound was barking and barking down beside the road. I went to see what was going on and I could hear a rattlesnake rattle. Never saw the snake- I grabbed the dog and backed up quickly, then turned and walked back to the house. We do have timber rattlers too and I'm guessing that's what that was but it's the only direct experience I have with one. 

We have some brown recluse around that I've seen and supposedly black widows, but I haven't seen those around, knock on wood.

No major predators- veeery occasionaly we'll hear coyotes and occasionally a bear is around but bears are so infrequent they usually make the news when they're around.


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## dahur (Dec 18, 2009)

Well, here in the desert, we have a lot of those things.
The video I took of a guest we had. I didn't kill him, I put him on a shovel and carried him over to the dry arroyo. 





This guest below I DID kill. I stepped out on the front porch, and didn't immediately recognize the sound I heard. I looked back to see this Rattler coiled up under the front door. I had stepped right over him, and he didn't strike! I don't know why, he was threatened, and rattlin' like crazy. 
I dispatched him with the shovel. I got lucky....this time.










A guy in Texas killed this one, and posted it for us. I would have had a heart attack.


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## Immolatus (Feb 20, 2011)

Whoa. If that thing bit you youre dead, right?

I had just started thinkin bout snakes. Me and my buddy went out to scope out a huntin ground for the season (Im gonna try my hand at it, Ive never hunted before) and we came across a dead rattler. He went on to warn me about snakes, and how careful you need to be, because where we were was pretty far out there, a good hours drive to any kind of medical facility. I said, "What do you mean, you can buy anti venin online, cant you?". I went home and looked it up. the only thing I found online was something from Mexico for $600/dose, and apprently yuou need like 10 doses. Ouch. Theres a shortage of the stuff, and I guess theres no guarantee youll get some if needed. After doing some reading, it looks like your only course of action is to not get bit?
That sucks.
The only real discussion I found about it was on another prepper forum. Nowhere else.
I prefer to keep my limbs. I find them incredibly useful.


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## Jezcruzen (Oct 21, 2008)

Statistically, Power is right. Dogs maim and kill more people in a year than you might think. Livestock takes a number of folks out, as well. 

Most wild animals will give you some warning if you are paying attention, allowing you to avoid any unpleasantness. 

If I lived out west in some of the suburban/forest interface areas having a population of big cats, I would be on my toes when out. A growing number of cougar attacks on mountain bikers and hikers is unsettling, so good situational awareness would be a good thing.

I have lived in Virginia all of my life and have had several people whom I respect tell me that they have seen a mountain lion here before. I never have. The state fish & game deny that any still exist here. But then, they said the same thing about coyotes for years. The state is crawling with them!


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## dahur (Dec 18, 2009)

Immolatus said:


> Whoa. If that thing bit you youre dead, right?
> 
> .


Neighbor was reaching into some brush last summer to pull weeds, and got bit in the hand. He said it hurt like hell, and when he got to the Hospital, there were 6 snake bite cases ahead of him. Doctor told him, almost no fatalities from snake bites here, unless allergic. According to Wikipedia, the rattlesnake venom is a "hemotoxin" that destroys tissue, and red blood cells. The anti venom is made from horses, which doesn't always agree with humans. 
Dr. said if you can get to a Medical facility within a couple hours should be ok. 
Left untreated it can cause a loss of limb, organ, or fatal.

I'm actually more scared of Brown Recluse here than the snakes, and other things.

_____________________________________________________________________

"I do not know with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones."
-Albert Einstein


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## BillS (May 30, 2011)

In this part of Wisconsin the only things that concern me are yellow jackets and mosquitos. I'm allergic to mosquito bites. They swell up and itch for days.


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## becky3086 (Aug 6, 2011)

We have snakes. LOTS of chicken snakes. I also had one copperhead last year and of course the water moccasins in the lake and Phil thought he saw a coral snake this spring. We have lots of brown recluses-I can't say that I worry about them a lot but Phil's brother got bit by one on the leg and still has the scar where his leg started to waste away. I found one little black widow in the front yard one year. One year we had some other kind of spider that made webs all over the yard and when you walked through the webs they bit. We got real careful about webs that year. We have scorpions, small ones but they sting pretty good, you get quick about seeing that tail come up though and being careful when picking up rocks in the garden or elsewhere. Ticks are bad in the woods here and always a concern since we...live in the woods, lol. :nuts:
Foxes, coyotes and bobcats. I have seen all of them though the bobcat was dead.


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## Halfway (Nov 26, 2009)

Grizzly bears and prairie rattlers.


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