Have I Mentioned That We Have Snakes in the Yard?

Seems like around here, every redneck grows up with tales of encounters (usually violently triumphant) with cottonmouths and copperheads.

One major inconsistency with this is that neither of those snakes are endemic* to southwestern Ohio. The only venomous snake we have is the massasauga rattlesnake, which is threatened, and I'd be over the moon to see one.

*I have heard credible reports of timber rattlesnakes well north of town, but I'd rate such an encounter as exceedingly uncommon. Similarly, I wouldn't completely shocked to see proof of a copperhead, though I feel certain that the slackjaws have been slaughtering legions of non-venomous snakes in their stead.

I spent much of my youth in rural Kentucky and heard stories of Cottonmouths, Copperheads and the occasional Rattlesnake, but in 7 years of living deep in the woods on a lake, I never saw one venomous snake. Lots of other ones, but nothing venomous. Either those snakes are pretty shy or rare or I'm just lucky...
 
I spent much of my youth in rural Kentucky and heard stories of Cottonmouths, Copperheads and the occasional Rattlesnake, but in 7 years of living deep in the woods on a lake, I never saw one venomous snake. Lots of other ones, but nothing venomous. Either those snakes are pretty shy or rare or I'm just lucky...

My Dad was from Stone County, Arkansas - right in the Ozarks.

Used to visit my Grandma during the summer. Saw a few Cottonmouths. One Copperhead.

Damn bloodsucking chiggers used to eat me alive.
 
And, number 10 is in the bucket (from the 7th Nov. '18).

This is a baby and appears to be a Western Red Diamondback. He is too young to ahve rattles yet.
As found, this time, once again, by Sarge. She knew better this time, and just came and got me to collect it for release:
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I'm a "rock gardener" with hundreds of tons of rock around here. The snake took off into the rocks that are right next to it when the camera flashed. So I broke out the thick leather welding sleeves and gloves, and gave chase. I also had a pair of kitchen tongs that I used to grasp it with, and dropped it into a waiting trash can.

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And, off to the bottom of our street to the river bottom wildlife/nature preserve, and, released.
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Number 10 is in the books.
 
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And, the first one of 2019 is in the books. This time a friendly variety, a Gopher Snake.
The little lzard on the wall was all about watching every move that the snake made. It would run up and down the wall for closer views before retaliating back to the top of the wall.
The blocks are 16" wide each.
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Spring is springing and the critters are emerging.

Immature gopher snake from around the end of February. This is the first snake of 2020.
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Then, we got one of the bitey ones for our second of the season.

Sarge and I had been out at the road, watching them repaving. I came back to the house, and walked across the front of the garage, and totally missed this guy, right at the corner of the garage, where I turn to get to the backyard.
Some .30sec later, Sarge comes blasting around the corner, looking all wide-eyed, muttering seomgthing about a rattler, and that I needed to grab my buckets and tools, and get it captured. So, I grabbed them and ran.
Problem: She didn't say where it was, and I was at full steam to get at it. In doing so, I all but ran into it.
I tipped my green waste snake catching bin, and, it crawled right in, without prompting. I tipped it up, and, Number 14, or, specimen 2020-05-05, was ready for transport down to the end of our road, at the river bottom wildlife/nature preserve.
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Ready for transport down-road.
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Then, yesterday, I was hauling sandbags back to the storage area, when I ran across this guy, a Cal King Snake.

The day before yesterday, Sarge pointed out a snake skin amongst the rocks in the planters. I looked at it, and thought it was a king snake skin. Sure enough, it was this dood, and, he was irridescent in colors with new skin.
This guy is extremely mellow. I walked by him with a wheelbarrow full of snadbags for an hour, and it never even flinched. I think it is one of our longtime patio pets.
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In preparation to burn off the vegetable garden this morning, I flipped over a piece of limestone and found two juvenile garter snakes. I picked them both up and took them to the front flower bed.
 
Excellent pictures. We've had Western Hog Noses, plenty of little garter snakes, a coral snake that I had to chase off. In the limestone quarry that our neighborhood was built around there are tons of rattlesnakes, and others of course. South Texas we seem to have mostly rattlesnakes, cotton mouths, copperheads, etc. I've seen some enormous, fat, old rattlesnakes a bit further south of us.

Our backyard does have plenty of tarantulas, and way more scorpions than I ever want to know about.

A couple years ago I was in Norway, hiking through knee high bramble and bog with a friend. We climbed up on a rock to get our bearings and saw:


The Norwegian viper, the ONE venomous snake that lives in Norway. Frankly, I'm surprised any snakes live there in that cold. They aren't terribly venomous or aggressive, which is good as I nearly stepped on him.

If you like rocks, you would love our quarry. I'll snap some pics next time I'm down there. Giant limestone slabs and boulders. There are a lot of granite quarries a bit northwest of here. I've gone there a few times to pick through their throw away piles, with permission of course. Wish I still had those bits now in fact.
 
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Just a harmless garter snake in the wood pile. I came across four of them when I was restacking, jumped every time.
 
And you live there for what reason???

My place is the red roof, near bottom left-center of image.
That open land (to the north),.... Cleveland Nat'l Forest. And it extends a good 35+ miles of wild lands to the north. To our east is more of the C.N.F., and Cal State Park lands, and native tribal reservation lands. It just keeps going as wild lands, on through the desert to Arizona.
Neighbors,... I've got to walk a couple of hundred yards in any direction to get to a neighbor.
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My place, below, and again, the reddish roof, a little closer to center this time. The house in the foreground, is my next door neighbor to the south. Between us is all wild, deep chaparral.
The Pacific Ocean is just below the pinkish clouds:
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just a mile down the road,... the Santa Margarita River nature preserve (where all the rattlesnakes get released).
When its dry:
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Add a little rain:
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