Young snake ID please

[Sigarms]

My father owned a surveying company, among other things. He was on a job where a grader had driven across a snakes nest, killing mama, but leaving a bunch of live babies. A few of the guys put the babies into their empty coffee cups and brought them home, my father ended up with two of them. This was the late 1970’s, way pre-internet, and even before my parents had Encyclopedia Britannica in the house, so my dad had no clue of ID on these cute little baby snakes.

They went into an aquarium we had from prior hermit crabs or gerbils, with a screened lid and a brick set atop that for safety. I suspect my father’s plan was to get a book on snakes at the library the next day, so he could figure out what they were.

In any case, at some point in the interim, 3-year old me thought it was a good idea to take the lid off the aquarium, and they got loose in the house. My mother gathered up us kids and we all went to stay at our grandparents’ house, while dad was left home to find the snakes.

He found one and set it free in the large open space behind our house, maybe 200 acres separating our development from the small highway running past our borough. It took him some time to find the second one, in which he finally figured out they were actually copperheads, before finally finding the second one dead inside a baseboard radiator.

Several years later, we were living in another part of town when they started developing that big open space behind our old house. There was an article in the newspaper about a large mature copperhead they had found in that field, and I can’t help but think it was ours.

GREAT story.

Somehow I think every father at some point in their life knows the "pain" of what your dad did.

Funny when you think about the information now available at our fingertips.

 

[scaredychicken]

i don't like snakes, and apart from Garter snakes they all make me nervous. (my gait and unsteady balance are probably the biggest reason of my concern though)

 

[Sigarms]

i don't like snakes, and apart from Garter snakes they all make me nervous. (my gait and unsteady balance are probably the biggest reason of my concern though)

I feel the same way, but I do think they get a bad rap. Even goes back to the bible. When you think about it, they (snakes) are remarkable creatures. No different than a hummingbird, but for whatever reason, hummingbirds can have a very different affect on you. Go figure.

 

[2manyrocks]

Don’t know anyone who died from a hummingbird bite, but do know a classmate who ended up in the hospital from being bitten by a rattlesnake.

 

[Too many Kubotas]

In California I came across quite a few rattle snakes, and even had a cat that caught and ate little ones.

Well, I don't like snakes, so I relocated them. To a nice underground facility.

 

[Sigarms]

Don’t know anyone who died from a hummingbird bite, but do know a classmate who ended up in the hospital from being bitten by a rattlesnake.

Don't know of many people that ended up in the hospital from a black snake, and they are actually good to have around

That said, don't know how many species of alligators or crocodiles there are, but I'm keeping from my distance from all of them

 

[Torvy]

Met one of my neighbors last week and as we were chatting a snake slithered across my driveway. He was wanting to kill it before he even knew what it was. I'm not 100% what it was, but it wasn't venomous, so I told him to let it be. I'd rather have the snake nearby than mice or rats.

 

[Threepoint]

Sigarms, glad you relocated the little guy without harming him. Looking closely at your photo, I'm quite sure it's a juvenile Eastern Black Rat Snake. Very common here, and beneficial to have around. Great for keeping the mice population under control.

One thing I don't much like is them occasionally climbing up in the barn to eat the noisy baby swallows in their nests! But that's nature. And as my Granddad used to say about everything from snakes to house mice: "They gotta' eat too, boy!"

 

[Too many Kubotas]

One thing I don't much like is them occasionally climbing up in the barn to eat the noisy baby swallows in their nests!

Do you really want their poop on hay and what not? It's halfway nasty stuff.

 

[Threepoint]

Do you really want their poop on hay and what not? It's halfway nasty stuff.

Ha! True, that. But the hay is stored in the loft, where the swallows can't get access. The adults like to build nests in the horse stalls, between the ceiling joists. The horses don't mind.

When the little ones fledge, though, I have to worry that the horses don't inadvertently step on them as they flutter around before the can get to the doors!