A Real OS Moment

[SEGARE]

Some of you may have seen this one.

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=1606317979503092

I have literally stepped within one foot of two EDB in my 56 years of roaming the woods of SEGA (that I know of). Neither bothered to rattle or strike. Both were coiled. Both times were in summer weather. A smaller 3 footer was buried in hardwood leaves in a dry creek bottom and my brother and I were walking shoulder to shoulder and split the snake between us. He saw the snake right as it was between us. He yelled and took a fast couple of steps. The heel of his boot hit my shin when he took off and I had a nice bruise for weeks. The other EDB (6ft) was sitting at the junction of two faint trails in stand of pines, nestled in a few sprigs of Broom Sage. The two trails weren't visible until I was 10 yards away and looking back at the snake. My brother stepped directly over the snake and I was one step behind him and saw the snake as I was mid-stride. All I could do was to make a high step like I was stepping over a fence. I yelled and pointed at what he had just stepped over. Both were moments that left us shaken and laughing.

 

[Willie]

He obviously didn't have a clue about about how fast a rattler can strike, or how far.
Touching his tail with his hand, certainly proved that.

He was certainly very lucky or this was some kind of set-up, being as the camera happened to be in an ideal spot.

 

[Texas10]

I was wondering why the camera person wasn't doing anything to help. Kept getting closer, repositioning for a better angle on the snake, but not helping!? Yea, I'm thinking he's a herpetologist and that's a snake he works with all the time. Probably freshly milked just in case it bit.

Several friends and I were hiking in the desert near Reno, NV. Stopped for a few minutes in the shade of a tree, and one guy was bit on the hand by a small diamond back as he set his camera down. Walked about an hour back to the car and headed to the hospital. Once there, they looked at it and said "yep, you've been bitten by a rattler. We can cut out the fang marks and stitch you up, but other than that, you're good to go".

We were dumbfounded! Over the next week his hand and, in fact his whole arm turned some strange shades of blue/black and swelled tremendously but then healed up nicely after a few weeks.

Maybe snake bites are like the coronavirus. Some get it and die, others get it and never show symptoms.

 

[SEGARE]

That is real fear.

 

[INTJ]

Looks staged to me and a snake
used to people.....

 

[Knotwild]

Since Eastern Diamondbacks are pit vipers and can sense body heat, I can't imagine the scenario with a totally wild snake - Mr. Snake would be in the defensive mode. I've had them get out of my way in the woods before I saw them, and then they coiled as if to say "I'm out of your way, pass on, but if you come over here it's going to be on!" For that reason, I didn't kill them. I knew a guy years ago who liked a cold Bud every now and then and he "collected rattlesnakes and brought them home. One freezing cold day, with Bud's encouragement, he decided to show off and took one a couple of feet long and dropped it inside his jacket. Bud didn't remind him that the heat would warm the snake up and make him more active, so when he reached in to get him out, he got a bite on the hand with max venom injected. They had to helicopter him to the hospital and they didn't think he would survive, but he was tough and made it. His doctor told him if he got bitten again, just stay home and die.

 

[Fast14riot]

That's Nick the Wrangler, he was some sort of "urban crocodile hunter" type guy from florida. I do not know if he has any degrees in the field, but in that clip he was out searching for EDB rattlers.

He was also arrested a couple years ago illegally buying a tiger, lol! Something about those Florida guys...

 

[ebb]

I wonder what the temperature was, they are less active the colder it gets

 

[Knotwild]

That's Nick the Wrangler, he was some sort of "urban crocodile hunter" type guy from florida. I do not know if he has any degrees in the field, but in that clip he was out searching for EDB rattlers.

He was also arrested a couple years ago illegally buying a tiger, lol! Something about those Florida guys...

Yes, for sure, FL is different. I knew a guy down there that would catch rattlers and pull their fangs out with pliers. He had one get loose in his house, but he wasn't too worried, until someone mentioned that the fangs grow back.

He worked for a guy that had two ultralights - Kenny. Kenny would take his buddy and they would fly over his neighbor's orange groves, shoot bucks, land, cut the head off for the rack and take back off. The guy who owned the groves was a judge and had a couple of guys that rode the property to protect it. The judge told his gamekeepers to use buckshot to shoot the ultralight down if they saw it poaching, then ride away and don't say a word to anyone. That ended poaching deer out of the ultralights because it wasn't worth the risk. So, they moved on from poaching to getting caught in a smuggling sting by the DEA.

Interesting times to be sure. Sorry, got off topic there.

 

[jonbearman]

Rattlers as well as other pit vipers can give whats called a dry bite. You still get a slight amount of venom which probably what happened to your friend. I have only seen 3 in my life and that was enough for me.

 

[Fast14riot]

Growing up spending my summers running all over gold country CA, I've run across many, many rattlers. They're pretty tasty. Pretty gnarly to see geese and peacocks take one out, too. My grandparents kept both on their property just for that.

 

[SEGARE]

This is one I came across a couple of years ago. He was 50 yds from the house after I spent all day in the woods cutting shooting lanes and watching every step. It took a good bit of prodding to get him riled up. I left him to crawl away.

 

[Outrider27]

Where I summered at my grandparents place in Cameron County, PA, they had a bounty on rattlers (timber rattlers in that area) some years, if they got to be a pest, and when they did, I took my trusty single shot Winchester 22 and bounty hunted them for, if memory serves, $1.25 each, proof being a rattle with an inch of fresh meet. And I had a few boards for preparing and drying the hides, which I sold to the local shoe repair and leather craft shop, where he used them to cover belts and hatbands. Nice income for a 10-12 year old in the mid 1950s; sometimes I made 10-11 dollars a week between bounties and selling hides, which was huge at my age in those days.

My great uncle was absolutely amazing if a rattlesnake needed killing - no firearm for him, he used a hoe, and his aim was uncanny. Severed the neck an inch or so behind the head, leaving an unspoiled hide. Don't know how he developed such skill with a hoe, but it worked for him.

 

[ebb]

The local snake guys told me a few years ago that a tourniquet when used will keep the poison that is the right dose to kill a rabbit in an area of your body that was the size of a rabbit. When that happens it was catastrophic to an arm or leg. They let the blood dilute it over your entire body and it is so thinned out it hasn't the strength to hurt you as bad.

 

[SEGARE]

A EDB bite causes some pretty severe hemolytic damage. Limbs often look like their going to fall off.