Desperado, I did that once up in Walla Walla County. I was at a remote repeater site and in the process of opening an old GE cabinet. Since it was a half height cabinet, I was squatted down and as I turned the key and opened the front door, a bull snake struck at me from within.

After I got my heart started again, I turned him into a greasy spot on the concrete floor. Normally I like bull snakes and enjoy having them around, but I had to do something to drain the adrenalin outta my system, and besides he started it.

Ran into these 2 on my honeymoon just a couple weeks ago. How often do you suppose someone stumbles upon mating rattlesnakes in the wild?




After they noticed me. That's both of them rearing up to look, still tangled together!

Y'know, if I caught you taking pictures while I was doing that, I'd probably strike out at you too!

Those pictures are just amazing though. Very cool.

Nosy

Remember when I was "Sentenced to Austin"?

Opened the cabinet, and there he was. Walked back to the truck for the S/A M6 and there was another one OTW to the truck. I got FOUR at the one site alone. I hate the Killeen/Temple area!

This thread is going to give me nightmares tonight!!!! Snakes just scare the crap out of me!!!!

*now heading off to the liquor cabinet for a hard drink of scotch*

We used to find bits and pieces of snakes in the radiator cowlings of diesel generators up at transmitter sites. I think they like to curl up in the engine since the block heater keeps them warm. Great place until the weekly gentest..

Pretty kitty! Why kitty buzzing? Too much caffeine?

My last rattler encounter was on a steep mountain trail. It wasn't hiking so much as climbing using hands and feet at that point.

My head came level with a granite shelf that had an occupant, eye level and way too close.

I believe I tapped the Force and teleported about five feet back.

Some of the areas I work and tend to are infested with serpents (mostly cottonmouth water moccasins with a healthy number of copperheads in the mix). The cottonmouths are particularly irritating because they mostly stand their ground. Generally I just go around them or wait them out. I've also found that even when cottonmouths are ready to strike, usually they don't unless you actually get very close to them or touch them. I cannot tell you the number of times someone has stepped within an inch of a cottonmough and not been struck. I do not and will not allow my crews to hurt them. My thought is that if you let them live, maybe someday they'll let you live. However, we do sometimes paint them with tree marking paint going in so that we can better see them on the way out. You can smell cottonmouths, and that distinctive smell is one way I know to be extra alert on some of the existing trails. Even on colder days I don't lower my guard all that much because they can be out sunning them selves higher up in the taller grass. Don't think your safe just because your looking down while your walking. Be on the lookout for the kinds of things snakes eat, because if you see a lot of that (such as frogs - at least in my area), your going to sooner than later see a lot of vipers. One remote tract of land I tend to is traversed by a bayou named Serpent. I found it is aptly named, in that in a single day you can see over a hundred cottonmouths there. If you stop anywhere while working there and don't see one, look out because you may be standing on it.