Snakes on the range !!

[trekrok]

I've been reading on snake identification. It's annoying. It goes like, look for the triangle head, but lots of good snakes flatten their head, so can't depend on it. Or, this snake is usually light brown, but may also be dark brown to almost black. Well, that's helpful.

So, I'm back to the only strategy that makes sense to me, and that's kill them all just to be sure.

 

[chadh2o]

The three Copperheads I saw this morning were apparently mature and didn't have the yellow tipped juvenile tail (just changed the above pic) with a very defined triangular shaped head.

Our head RSO did send out an email to club members today warning everyone to be careful........having learned where there is a easy food source I'd be willing to bet that the snakes return tonight to dine on young frogs.

They were lucky it was you and not me. I would have hunted a shovel from the shed and ended their butts.
BTW, I didn't receive the email.

 

[thor447]

Or there’s a bunch of lucky snakes here. I’m terrible at snake identification. While they may be good to keep populations of other pests in check, if they come around my place of business or home, they will be destroyed! I showed in a thread the other day what my vehicle did to a decent sized rat snake after rolling over him a few times, then parking the front tire on him and turning the wheel on a gravel road.

 

[dennishoddy]

Was on the range about 0620 this morning and noticed, although I wasn't going to shoot paper, I saw that there were no paper targets so I hiked over to the stat house to get a few for the other shooters.

Got about 20' from the stat house and saw a snake stretched out up against the building and when I got a little closer I could see that it was definitely a Cooperhead.....per the pic in this thread https://www.okshooters.com/threads/copperhead.315876/

and this pic from the web......."Updated pic of adult / not a juvenile with yellow tipped tail"
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I had no desire to kill it but I wanted to at least get it away from the stat house so I walked over to the tool area and got a long handle rake to herd it along back to the wood line.

As I was herding it along I saw two other Copperheads within 20'-30' of the first around the perimeter stat hose......I think what is drawing the snakes in is that the stat house has security lights on all night and I noticed somewhere around 30 or 40 dime size frogs hopping around that are drawn to the area because the lights draw bugs and the snakes are drawn in by the frogs.

Anyway, two of the snakes herded along fairly good but one had a attitude and clamped down on the rake twice and lunged and struck at me 3 times before I got him far enough from the area surrounding the stat house.

Finally I went back to the pistol range and did what I came to the range for in the first place which was to run 50 rounds of 45ACP through my Ruger SR1911......after all the excitement and snake herding I guess I was kinda wound up because I didn't shoot all that well but still enjoyed myself.

I called the TCGC main Range Safety Officer earlier explaining what happened as he's going to send a email out to all members telling them to be extra careful at the range especially around all building that are security light lit at night.

Pretty sure the new security light I put on the shop attracted our copperhead. We created a food source in our neck of the woods.
Part of our security system that isn’t going away. Just have to pay attention where hands and feet are placed.

 

[Seadog]

I live in OKC, and we've had an invasion of snakes in our suburban neighborhood. Someone actually found a five foot rattlesnake in their backyard the other day, which is an extremely rare occurrence in this part of the state, especially in the city.

Last year I’m not sure what type of snake I killed. After I dispatched it I held it up by the tail with the head touching the ground with my arm straight out so it was a good 5 foot also. My wife came into the house screaming at first and told me there was this monster big snake in the backyard. Then I went out there and couldn’t find it at first because it’s gone up the crate Myrtle. I had a 2 x 4 in the back that I used to knock it out of the tree and then I used a machete to terminate the evil trespasser. I haven’t seen a snake since but it doesn’t mean they haven’t been sneaking around

 

[Seadog]

I've been reading on snake identification. It's annoying. It goes like, look for the triangle head, but lots of good snakes flatten their head, so can't depend on it. Or, this snake is usually light brown, but may also be dark brown to almost black. Well, that's helpful.

So, I'm back to the only strategy that makes sense to me, and that's kill them all just to be sure.

Also supposedly if the snake has round pupils it’s not poisonous and if it has cat’s-eye slanted pupils then it’s poisonous. My problem is I’m not getting that close to figure out. Pop pop pop pop or swack with a machete or axe

 

[BReeves]

I do not like killing good snakes, they are for sure less destructive than the critters they eat. Have heard about the eyes being the best way to tell if it is good or bad and so far it has worked for me. I didn't mind rattlers when I lived in California, at least they tell you before they kill you and it was the only bad snake you were likely to run across. Oklahoma is a different ball game.

 

[Hangfire]

They were lucky it was you and not me. I would have hunted a shovel from the shed and ended their butts.
BTW, I didn't receive the email.

The email was sent yesterday afternoon around 4:38 p.m., the snake headsup was included in a workday reminder for this coming Friday 18th.

If you did not receive the email and you have a current one on file with TCGC you might want to contact-------> head RSO Ken Anderson at email CRSOTCGC.US.......he's the person I initially contacted yesterday.

 

[trekrok]

Also supposedly if the snake has round pupils it’s not poisonous and if it has cat’s-eye slanted pupils then it’s poisonous. My problem is I’m not getting that close to figure out. Pop pop pop pop or swack with a machete or axe

Pupil seems to be a consistent identifier at least. I'll examine them when head and body are two pieces.

 

[DavidMcmillan]

I had a preacher tell me once that, to him, there are only three kinds of snakes; live ones, dead ones, and sticks that look like snakes.