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+1! A 12-ga would be good, because I'm not sure I have a shovel that big! I have no problem with spiders, but I'm not at all fond of snakes.

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LEO since 1981.

Another +1. We've got lots of Coopers Hawks where I live... one of my favorite things is to see them on my way to work. Rather see them than snakes!

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LEO since 1981.

Welcome to Arizona.

My take is to remove it (dead or alive) from your homestead; out in the woods, leave them alone. Be glad you didn't step on the viper! I have been working and hunting around snakes for many years and try not to kill them, they have a right to live in their own environment.

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"Life is short, hunt hard"

I beg to differ sir--a snake has only one destiny---to die where he is discovered.
Blessings

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TEXAS, by GOD

Lenny, you want rodent control get a cat, you need more rodent control get two cats and don't feed them. As for rattle snakes in your yard, be nice and introduce them to Mr. 12 Gauge. Or why not kill two birds with one stone get a mongoose or two, and don't feed them.

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Always Stay Strong!

That reminds me of a story in Readers' Digest Humor in Uniform column years ago. An officer wanting to release mongooses on a Pacific island before invasion, to kill local snakes, asked the veterinary department for mongooses. But he didn't know the plural of "mongoose", so he said, "Send me a mongoose, and while you're at it, send several more."

But mongooses breed and become local problems. And they weren't effective against habu pit vipers on the Jap-held islands. They strike much faster than cobras, and the mongooses died.

I'm not sure that it's even legal to keep mongooses in many states. Ditto for variants, like meerkats. I know a wildlife artist in Norway who's very interested in mustelids.
If anyone has questions about keeping them or their natures, I can ask her about it. I know that some keep ferrets. They probably kill snakes.

But keep in mind that bit about the habus: rattlesnakes are also very quick-striking pit vipers. The mongoose may well be killed.

This intrigues me. I'm gonna ask Hanna if she knows if mongooses can ever successfully kill vipers. The Russell's viper (Tic Polonga) lives in India, where mongoose -killing of cobras became a legend. I've never heard of them killing Russell's vipers. If that snake seems familiar, one was featured in a Sherlock Holmes story, "The Speckled Band." They are very dangerous. India suffers some 40,000 cases of snakebite death a year, according to figures from the WHO. I'm sure that a lot of those deaths are caused by the Russell's viper. The other big contributors are the cobras and kraits, of course.

T-Star

As I recall, the snake in question had been trained to respond to a bell, and was fed with a saucer of milk --- how dangerous can a milk-lapping snake be?

Doyle was being pretty optimistic about training snakes, I think. His gun knowledge was also quite limited. I'd have hated to face The Hound of the Baskervilles with the sort of revolver that Holmes carried.

The guns used in his, "The Lost World" were also of questionable selection, and they had no handguns. * His more or less contemporary, Sir Henry Rider Haggard ("King Solomon's Mines", "She", etc.) was far more knowledgeable about firearms.

I've never heard of a snake lapping milk. Some authors take too much license!

T-Star
* The recent TV show based on this book, filmed in Australia, had much better guns, but the idea that Marguerite Krux could kill a dinosaur with a single shot from her .32 or .38 was just an effort to thrill girls who saw her as a PC-empowered superwoman. I have a lot of respect for the actress (Rachel Blakely), but the writers knew more about fantasy than they did about guns! BTW, in the book, there were no white women after the expedition left London, but TV provided some hot chicks to make the show well worth watching. And I liked Lord Roxton's Colt .45 auto, his ivory-butted Webleys, and his .416 Rigby.

Looks like either a diamondback or a mojavhe. Neither are protected in AZ and the limit is 4 per year, dead or alive.

If you have ever seen a pet or a person who has received a snake bite from a rattler, you wouldn't leave that snake in the vicinity.

If you don't want to kill it, find a way to move it, but don't leave it near your residence. It's natural instinct is to strike even if you are polite and kind to critters. He's a loaded gun waiting for a victim.

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Eccentric old coot

I worked summer of 1973 South East of Butte MT. The only things I remember that made a new guy suspect was failing to close cattle gates and not swerving to run over snakes.

It's a type called a SNAKEUS TARGETIM. That's Latin for "Shoot This Thang."

CW

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If it has more wins then loses its not a diamondback.

Iggy's right!
EXCEPT
If you don't KNOW how to move it - KILL IT!

I believe in leaving most snakes alone - Really!
But a snake with a head like that is soon a DEAD SNAKE.
Then cut the head off with a shovel and bury it.

When I lived in Orlando some neighborhood kids were fooling with a dead poisonous snake. One of the kid's got his arm scratched with a fang from A DEAD SNAKE. Kid wound up losing his arm!

Them suckers are nothing to fool with!!!

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In dog years I'm dead.

I see that (ANYWHERE) and it's snake dinner and free hatband. Case closed, court adjourned.

Me and Mr. Snake Charmer would have put da Charm on dat snake.

Rule 303

Aloha,

Makes me glad I live in Hawaii.

The only snakes we have are in the legislature and it's unlawful to harm them.

Once again,,,,No snakes allowed near the house,,especially those that can kill you.

Get rid of the compost bin if it attracts rodents that attract snakes that can kill you.

For a number of years I worked on an Army base outside of Yuma, AZ. Since the base was, for the most part, 1800 square miles of open desert, we had more than our share of Western Diamondbacks and Sidewinders.

Funny thing was that the base had us go through annual training on dealing with snakes. They frequently stressed that Western Diamondbacks were protected but Sidewinders were not. In order words kill the Sidewinders but call the MP's to catch and relocate the Diamondbacks.

Watching the MP's gather up those snakes was an experience in itself. I couldn't believe it, however, when I saw the MP's grab a live Diamondback by the tail and hold it in the air!

I've already seen two, and killed one, WD on my place here in New Mexico. Any I see around the house are immediate targets. We don't mess with those things.

My daughter was bitten on her ankle by a copperhead several years ago, and she was off her feet for nearly a month recovering from that thing. Fortunately no plastic surgery was required.

WDs are nothing to trifle with. They are extremely dangerous and can strike with little or no warning. See one, kill one, especially around your home. You never know when one may be lurking in an unseen place.

You can see 2 of the rattlers in the 2nd photo. They are the 2 dark roundish thing near the center of the snale coil. Just to the left of the leaf with the orange spot that is over the snake.

"But the Timber and Canebrake rattlers didn't live around bison herds, nor did most Eastern Diamondbacks. Go figure!"

We used to have bison here in the East. All were killed off by the early 1800s. Whenever I go to my folks home in the Winchester, Virginia area, I cross Buffalo Creek, located in the mid Shenandoah Valley.

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John 3:16
WAR EAGLE!

I usually focus on the photos over the text also. I think it's intended that way. Does anybody read it?



Back to topic. My vote under these facts is THUMBS DOWN.

Good chance to see if it really does taste like chicken. Nuff said.

I recommend putting a tracking collar on it.

I understand why it might work out pretty well as a rodent deterrent, and it appears to have been quite successful so far. But if you put a tracking collar on it and evaluate it's motions, you may be able to determine the source of their operations. Then a good airstrike or bunker buster will take out their whole cell.

But you don't want these things to get out of control and have them possibly used against you.

"Smart" snakes...the next technological advance in vermin control!

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" I said, good DAY! "

CHOOT 'IM ELIZABETH!!!

OP ~ Here's a good partial description of the western diamondback - "There are two dark diagonal lines on each side of its face running from the eyes to its jaws. It has dark diamond-shaped patterns along is back. The tail has black and white bands just above the rattles." Although the rattles cannot be seen in your picture, the dark diagonal lines on each side of its face running from the eyes to its jaws can be seen quite clearly. The viper shaped head is an instant giveaway that it is indeed venonmous. With my limited experience, I would say you've definitely encountered a western diamondback.

I'm going on the pulpit now so alot of you may not like what I have to say but, being a former PA Wildlife Conservation Officer, one thing that has always bothered me about people versus dandergous wild animals is the "kill it attitude". As the human population increases, we build and make our homes in the last areas animals like this have to survive. We then create our own problems by having things like compost piles, home garbage storage areas, bee hives and on and on. Then, when animals such as rattlesnakes, bears, wolves, coyotes, etc. show up and do what they do best, we start to scream things like "the only good snake is a dead snake." That's alot like closing the barn door after all the cows have gotten out.

Don't get me wrong - if I had encountered that snake at my home, it would have been dead instantly (around here we deal with copperheads and timber rattlers) although you have a bigger problem than killing "the one" you happened to see. My point is, the "kill em all" attitude is ludicrous and people need to adopt a preventative attitude if they choose to live where these ecologically important and wonderful animals call home. A rattlesnake's main diet is small rodents, correct? Compost piles attract small rodents naturally, correct? Increased numbers of small rodents in an area that has alot of rattlesnakes naturally is like ringing a wild dinner bell. Get rid of the compost pile and or whatever else is drawing the snake's food supply in. Eliminate the rodent's food source and kill any remaining vipers you see. Through your diligence and ability to create an anti-snake environment, the problem will resolve itself naturally.

Hell, in that pic, I can even SEE the rattle. It's a bit bluish, and right in the middle of the snake rolls.
I like snakes well enough. But in the spring, in AZ, you need to be REAL observative when you start to see some snakes. They are coming out of hibernation. They are hungry, and still groggy. They will kill a dog or a child if there is not a good hospital nearby.
You need to watch and see how many show up; you need to determine if there is a den nearby, or if this was just a traveler on his way.
At the very least, remove the snake from the area, and drop him out in the desert a ways off. Preferrably, in an open field with a hawk or 3 circling overhead.........

Actually, what you see that is "bluish" is the start of the snakes tail which, on a WD, should be "black and white bands." I apologize for using the word rattles above when describing the tail. The rattle itself is brownish in color and cannot be seen in the OP's photo but the strat of the tail can be seen.

Curl-

Yeah, I often do read the political, environmental, and entertainment articles and interviews. Occasionally, the fiction. Alas, the quality of most interviews has decreased greatly in recent years. The one I recall best recently is that with Robert Redford. He is even a little more to the left than I'd realized, but is an impressive filmmaker and star.

You like classic English rifles. Did you see him in, "Out of Africa"? It had a lot of PC content, but deserved its seven (?) Academy Awards, and made that era of East Africa come alive in what was basically the true story of white hunter Denys Finch-Hatton, Baroness von Blixen-Finecke (Isak Dinesen, to use her pen name) , her husband Bror, and assorted settlers, soldiers, and some rather toothy lions. Redford playe Finch-Haton, not bothering with a British accent. Did it well, though. Even looked a lot like the real F-H.

BTW, I did later read that shark attack article. They got the guy who runs the World Shark Attack File in Florida. He went to Egypt, dug around, and concluded that a sloppy New Zealand trawler had been throwing garbage (sheep carcasses) overboard in the Red Sea that caused unuusual shark activity that probably contributed to the attacks. BUT...the Red Sea is already known as a hotbed of shark attacks. In one case, not in that article, a British soldier was washing his Land Rover, I think in a tributary stream, in about three feet of water. A shark grabbed him.

The article was good and basically fair, and told how government bumbling and incompetence by hotel operators also contributed to the attacks.

Back to snakes, one post here tells hiw to recognize a Western Diamondback. It's valid, but the description also fits the even more deadly Mojave rattler, which resembles the WD so closely that it often requires a specialist to tell them apart. And the Mojave, in most populations, has a more potent nuerotoxin that is especially grave in its actions. In this, it mimics the Tropical Rattlers, Crotalus durissis sp., which are known for the venom shutting down respiration and affecting nerve functions. Many Latinos believe they strike so hard that they break the victims' necks. In actuality, the nerves and muscles can no longer support the head.

Simply put, NO rattlesnake can be tolerated around the living areas of humans. Anyone who thinks otherwise is playing withn fire, and if one bites him or a loved one, he can reflect in misery on his lack of wisdom in not killing the snakes. In wilderness country, they can often be spared. Not around home!