As long as its not poisonous it doesnt bother me to have them around.
If you find one hibernating within the woodpile in the late fall just cover it up with some mulch/hay/grass clippings and it should be OK.... they go into a pretty deep sleep and would freeze to death otherwise.
If you find one hibernating within the woodpile in the late fall just cover it up with some mulch/hay/grass clippings and it should be OK.... they go into a pretty deep sleep and would freeze to death otherwise.
The snakes or the lawyers??
I came home one day this winter to find a very lethargic snake sunning itself on my cement walkway. Tossed him into the woods. I hate snakes as much as warren hates elm.
Thought rather rare to find I have seen a couple Eastern Timber Rattlers. My area is hilly and very rocky. Lots of broken ledge clifts in the state forest acrost the street. Just the enviorment these rattlers like. However very rare to actually site one. They are considered endangered species in MA. One should not kill them. I have never seen them on my acerage.
Thought rather rare to find I have seen a couple Eastern Timber Rattlers. My area is hilly and very rocky. Lots of broken ledge clifts in the state forest acrost the street. Just the enviorment these rattlers like. However very rare to actually site one. They are considered endangered species in MA. One should not kill them. I have never seen them on my acerage.
I was cutting wood in South Carolina once and noticed that there were snakes hanging from the trees. Makes woods work even more interesting than it already is.
The Misses always throughs a few mothballs in amongst the wood shed, does not seem to bother the chipmunks as they still are there, we don’t get snakes, mice or skunks in the shed. We have a few cords outside and keep that wood on pallets and it does not seem to attract the grass snakes. Other places in the yard we do see quite a few grass snakes.
We accidently found a great way to keep snakes off from the property.... Jack Russel Terrier. Our guy, Jake, protects our frog pond, shed, and garden like its his full time job and caught himself a gardner snake the other day. Fortunetly, for his sake, there are hardly any poisenous snakes in this area. He also works hard to keep all other wild animals out of his yard. I think the dog believes he’s about 10 times bigger than he really is.
With our pooch we have similar experience Eva is mix of Rot, Newfy, Chow...about 75 lbs… she can’t get near the moth balls and does not like them. She guards the frog pond also. One day she was barking and I figured it was a snake on the lawn...sure enough...as I got to the sliding door, she had it in her mouth and flung the snake about 15 feet in the air into the cedar hedge...I just about fell over I was laughing so hard...Not sure if she picked it up first to play.. or the snake tried to strike and then she grabbed it. Suzanne did not believe me....the next day while weeding buy the pond she sees a 2 1/2 ft long grass snake that is all torn up...but still moving.
Ran across a Gartner snake on Saturday last. He was as suprised as I was and actaully coiled up and faux struck like he was going to jump. Wife was more suprised and next thing I know, she’s the the machette and is ready to use said machette till I pointed out that snakes=less mice, field or otherwise...we live where our house backs to woods...so...lesser of 2 evils lives on to slither another day thankfully.
I never realized how aggressive a gartner could/can be till I verified the snake with web and book on snakes and read in depth about them and their habits.
My neighbor has one of those little, puffy white dogs. He’s smaller than my wife’s big, fat cats. One thing I’ll say about Murphy, what he lacks in stature, he more than makes up for in both enthusiasm and attitude.
