"songbird" wrote in message
Farm1 wrote:

Today I decided that I needed to face the fear so went back and had a
look
in the bin. No snake thankfully. I decided that I'd use my compost
screw
to aerate the bin and was prepared to drop all and run if I pulled up a
snake. All went well - just lots of wriggling red compost worms.

*whew!* but now you are on-edge all the time out
there. are they climbers?

Not that I've heard but the other common snake we get here (tiger snake)
supposedly is. According to a herpitologist I spoke to when I had one of
those in my wood shed. they like to climb into bushes at about chest height
and arealso commonly about after dark. His advice was not to go wandering
about outsside at night.

will you be rousting about looking for it?

No. These snakes are elapids and thus highly dangerous and best givne a
very wide berth. I think the only elapid the US has is the coral snake and
although I know the US does have rattler hunts, I don't think that coral
snake hunts are common :-)).


But otherwise, on the plus side in the garden, I finally have tomatoes
just
about ripe, there are zucchini on the bushes and it looks like we might
get
an excellent crop of apples and pears.

oh good! i'm glad to hear you have a fruit
crop this year.

We've had a major strawberr glut. That was a delight but we're now waiting
or a second round to crop.


I just hope that is the last sodding snake I see for the season. Ever
again
would be good, but that is way too much to hope for.

i will hope you won't see any more of those kind
of snakes soon unless you are moving them along to
another home. protective gear, yep, i'd be wearing
it too no matter how much i sweated.

There really is no option aobut moving them along. They just live here and
that's that. the worst thing was having Jack Russells. They regulalry went
fo rthe snakes and ende dup costing us a fortuen in anti-venine. We lost an
ealry one we had but then the next two cost us a bomb. One was over $5K
alone - about $2K of that was snake bites. Add to that the organophosphate
poisoning the little sods got and it's clear how much we liked those little
brutes since we shelled out so much to keep them alive. Sadly we now just
have a Cavalier King Charles and he's dumb and boring, but stays away from
snakes.

On Mon, 31 Dec 2012 10:17:20 -0500, songbird
wrote:

i hope everyone out there in r.g.e land
has a great season -- even those folks down
under who are having a nice summer right
about now.


songbird

I can tell the new year has started: seed catalogues. I really don't
need any more seeds this year but I will probably find something else
that looks interesting. I could probably get through 10 years with
the seeds I have. Maybe not the varieties I would like but enough to
keep me busy.

Right now I am feeling pretty good and hope it lasts. But I shall not
over plant this season. (Sure)
--
USA
North Carolina Foothills
USDA Zone 7a
To find your extension office
http://www.csrees.usda.gov/Extension/index.html

songbird wrote:
Doug Freyburger wrote:
Farm1 wrote:

It'd be nice to live where there were no venomous snakes but I live in an
area where we have highly venomous elapids. That is just a fact of life.
Keep the eyes peeled and wear long pants and boots and that is about the
best I can do if I want to keep enjoying my surrounds.

Move far enough north of the snow line and there are no vemonous snakes
and few enough of the other sorts. You pick your situation and you pay
your price.

As was pointed out this can be south of the snow line south of the
equator or above the snow line in mountainous areas.

EASTERN MASSASAUGA RATTLESNAKE (Sistrurus
catenatus catenatus) is venomous and above the
snow line. not sure how widely it is beyond
Michigan but it is here for sure.

a lady down the road from us here (less than
1/2 mile) had several of them removed from her
property.

even though they are not highly toxic they can
still do some damage and i wouldn't want to be
bitten by one.

That's the only exception I know of. Copperheads seem common near the
snow line but seem to die out in the winter any time they move into a
region where it snows. A few warm years and poisonous snakes can
migrate, then it snows and they are gone again. Except the Eastern
Massasauga.