Snakes and Stones

Love that!  Looks like she's saying "Don't even THINK about touching my rock!" 

Photo #25




My relatives know that I tumble rocks--they always collect any 'interesting ones' they find in our area.  About half the time I get those shown above...the other half of the time the 'special rock' is usually a piece of granite or gneiss...  

As always...great pics! Nice tumble on that Salmon River rock!

Snakes using rocks as camouflage would be a good post in the Member Photography section.  

Hmmm a type of rock to make a regular pet boa (Red-tail) camouflage is an interesting question:  I couldn't really say...Red tail boa color/patterns can vary between individuals.  Their colors can be a range between tan, green, red, or yellow at different spots.  They can have lines, shapes, and circles in their patterns.  They are really designed to blend into a scene instead of the ground itself--so picking rocks would be challenging for a semi-arboreal species...if purely done for photo purposes I would probably recommend hand-picking the pieces to match--I might check out: sandstone, picture jasper, or a slightly darker color variant of something like I found in the woods in Photo #27:

Hahaha, if you said 'Native boa' then you would have gotten me.  As I clarified it in my following post as a 'Red-tail'---no such luck for you!  

I have a Tiger Salamander as well, he is 16 years old--I do enjoy his beady little eyes.  I don't think I would take him for a walk though...I'm not certain how I would even do that...

I can't say that all Chinese people are afraid of snakes...truth be known the financial elite from China (and the Middle East) frequently buy high-end snakes...it is just another status symbol thing-along with cars and yachts...

By the way,I realize there is a possibility that you thought I was making a joke about that species and psychiatrists and ophidiophobia sessions. I wasn't. It's because of its monochromatic non-threatening appearance, gentle disposition, slow motion movements and super soft texture. Even the irises of the eyes are the same color as the body. And to my knowledge, one has never been known to bite someone holding it. Here's a closeup of its head.

Wondering if holding a rubber boa might result in a bite is kind of like wondering if a moth flying around your bedroom might attack. It's technically possible, but so unlikely as to be silly to contemplate.

I worked in a lab with a very large eastern diamondback rattler once, a true nightmare snake. It ate fat prairie dogs that I got dead from a wildlife refuge. The cage had 8 locks, and required 4 herpers all with keys to only 2 of them, so could never be opened without 4 people there. In this venomous snake lab, we had red slam buttons all over the place that called an ambulance automatically. All were viperids, not elapids (mostly cobras). This cage had only one side you could see in. We had to hire janitors. We begged them to never ever ever go on the other side of this cage and see what was in it. But...people have this insatiable curiosity about what they are afraid of...

One I was working in the lab at night late at a desk. It was a new janitor which I had properly prepped. I had warned him that I would mop on the other side of that cage. But it sounded to me like he was mopping that way. Suddenly, I heard a gasp and a strange gutteral sound. A fraction of a second later the rattles started. This snake could rattle so loud, that it even scared me and it would run continuous for several hours. Then I heard running and the front door to the lab slam open. Then I heard the mop handle hit the floor. He had run so fast that he had made it all the way to the front door before the mop he dropped hit! The mop handle just have been almost perfectly vertical when he took off at a sprint. Then all I heard was tires fishtailing all over the gravel parking lot and rocks spraying the side of the lab. I think this guy would be a good candidate for snake sensitivity training if he recovered--which I doubt, the poor guy. We went through a lot of janitors.

This was one of the few snakes in my life I was genuinely afraid of. Though atypical for this species, it was always pissed off. It would hit the prairie dogs with such a hard strike that we could just imagine a person being knocked off their feet in the palmettos in Florida where this monster was caught. Its head was so large, with thick, blocky sides like a brick. I had nightmares about this snake about once per year for a while. Now it's been decades and I still have nightmares about it every few years when I wake up and jump off the bed in a sweat and scare my wife half to death.

I actually had a snake nightmare Sat night when rockhounding on a trip in New Mexico. I jumped out of a car onto a field, and while in the air was heading down to land on the ground and saw several cottonmouths around where I would land. In mid air, like a cat, I sort of twisted and heaved such that my legs landed between them to minimize the chance of being nailed. Apparently, it must have been pretty real, because I'm actually sore today and bending down to pick up something hurts.

In 2008, I worked on a ranch in Texas and saw over 1,000 cottonmouths in 30 days. Between them, the coral snakes, the copperheads, the one rattlesnake, and the alligators and THE FIREANTS, it was what most people would consider a living nightmare. It was so bad, that every single time I would stop my 4Runner on this ranch (so large it had its own zipcode) I would never step out of the truck lest I stepped on a cottonmouth which I nearly did multiple times.

One day I was walking in the middle of a big dry field, at least 1/2 mile from any creek or boggy area. Cottonmouths are mostly associated with damp places, but they can be anywhere. Out in the middle of this shortgrass field was an old concrete block building, just a simple concrete structure. There was no trash or anything on the outside to hide a dangerous snake from my eyes. It was just one room, totally empty and clean. Except, that is, for one old piece of crooked plywood maybe 3x3' in the middle of the floor. I thought, there's only one place where a snake could be. What's the chance there is a big old mean nasty cottonmouth under the board, the only hiding place and 1/2 from any moist place. No way. But then again...

I got my snake stick ready, flipped that plywood, and wham! It was airborne toward me in a strike and I had to jump fast. A big dark very aggressive one just waiting to nail me hard. They can go airborne in the strike with momentum if everything works just right. After that, I never trusted any square inch of that ranch ever again.

In early writings in the 1800s, there are stories of the southern US just "writhing with venomous snakes". Most herpers including me have always presumed these are exaggerations. Well, I personally know from my work on the Pierce Ranch that it can happen. In that month, I counted about 1,400 venomous snakes in 31 days. I was there to work with the wildlife. The rancher begged me not to tell him or any ranch hands how many snakes I saw so I didn't.

The copperhead you mention is a species that you need not fear very much. Their venom isn't usually more than an irritant. But the cottonmouth, which is in the same genus so very closely related, is very dangerous. They pack a big dose of very potent venom. The only time I ever got nailed by a venomous snake was a copperhead when I was 10 years old. It was "dry" bite. I had the fang marks in my foot but no venom was injected. Vipers have this option. To inject or not. When I use the word viper, I refer to snakes that have hollow fangs in the front of their mouth that fold when not in use. For general purposes, this includes all venomous snakes dangerous to humans in this country except the coral snake, such as the many rattlesnake species, and the copperhead and cottonmouth.

My DH and I raised mostly colubrid snakes (kingsnakes and milksnakes, with a boa or python thrown in) for about twenty years. We had about sixty breeders, and produced a couple/three hundred snakelings a year. We got out of them when it became too much work to take care of them, raise their food, and work 40 hours a week. Also, when everybody and his brother realized how easy it is, and the bottom fell out of the prices. A snake that sold retail for several hundred dollars one year wouldn't fetch you $40 retail, or even $15 wholesale just a few years later!! (Tangerine Honduran milksnake.)

We did not raise any "hots" - venomous - so never really worried about being bitten. Had four green tree pythons, they had sharp teeth. Had a pair of Bismarck Ringed pythons. They had some sharp teeth, but these were pretty docile. The worst biter was a female black rat snake. She had the nastiest disposition of all the snakes we've ever owned! We had to put her up in one of the top row cages, as anytime someone walked in the room, she would start striking the glass and have a hissy fit! Got rid of her the first chance I got.

One night, I had to use the bathroom. Walked in there without turning the light on (as usual). Sat down and felt something touch my foot. It was a 5 to 6 foot long Mexican black kingsnake that had crawled out of his/her (don't remember which) cage that I must have left unlocked. It would never have bitten me, just glad I did not step on it.

We got out of the snake business about 15 years ago. I don't miss them, all the work involved, or the shows we used to sell at.