I recoil at the sight of snakes, but I don't try to kill them. When I lived
in north Florida, I gave them a wide berth, because there were so many
poisonous varieties there. Many shared the various swimming holes I went to.
I tried to stay in the white sandy areas, so as to be able to see their
bodies swimming toward me and hightail it out of the water....LOL
It was not unusual to find snake carcasses, or beheaded snakes in the
garden, so apparently other snakes and some species of birds found them easy
to kill. One kind of bird nested in a gourd I hung from a tree in my garden
and it turned out to be a variety that liked to line its nest with the snake
skin that had been shed. I had a few frights when those things would drop
out of the gourd.....LOL
I have never seen anything but little snakes in Spokane, although I think
it's possible that there is a rattler or two out there. We could probably
use more snakes here, but we're not overrun with mice and rats either, so
maybe they're in something of a balance. A few years ago PBS had a special
on a new school built in Saskatchewan, I believe, which was sited on an old
snake winter hibernation den. They showed footage of the snakes arriving by
the THOUSANDS, creeping in doors, windows, ledges, heating ducts, etc. It
was like a horror movie...
"paghat" wrote in message
news
In many regions, just before winter, snakes migrate from considerable
distances to shared dens. In some places even kingsnakes that eat other
snakes den harmlessly with species they would eat at any other time of the