Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire little rattler.

Judging by, and comparing to the tire - that's a BIG one.
I've been called a liar for stating that I have personally seen killed (not by me) western diamondbacks of 9 and 10 feet.
16 and 17 inches around - just behind the head.

Call me a liar again, boys!

Strange looking video.

I saw a pic once of one 10 ft long. Mexican was standing on back of a flat bed truck with his arm holding its head as high as he could reach. The tail was still on the ground.

My cousin killed one when we were deer hunting in East Texas once with his double barrel while making a driive with his deer hound, Suzie. He was walking down a 5 foot deep dry branch looking for tracks to put her on when she was started acting up. He looked up and it was coiled and looking him in the face from about 5 ft. He would have walked right by it. It had 22 rattles and a button and he said it was a good bit longer than he was tall. He was well tanned being about half Indian but was pretty pale and shaken when he walked up to me on stand and called it a day.


Biggest ive seen myself was near 9 ft. Barry saw a big one once he reported on here iirc over 8 ft. Wish he would chime in.

I read a report of a resercher as a teen of one killed in Mexico of 11 ft.

Mark, where were those monsters you saw.

one day i was driving up highway 93 north of wickenburg, saw a buzztail in the south lane. I slammed on the brakes with the intent of backing up and running over the sucker, he made it to the knee high grass off the road. so i jumped out of the truck, wearing shorts, with a handgun to put him in snake heaven. I couldn't see him for the grass, and i got to thinking he could see me with that thermal vision. so this ol fat man started crowhopping back to the road. he won. my wife was in tears. good thing tho, about a quarter mile down the road was a highway patrol officer, probably wouldn't have appreciated me opening up from the road.

near that area, the son of a rancher i knew at spent too much time at the sultana bar in wickenburg one night, was on the way to the ranch and they saw a buzztail in the road. they stopped with the idea of stomping it to death. which they started to do. being drunk, they forgot they had taken off their heavy construction boots, and had on tennies. snake bit through the shoe, about a week in the hospital. Lucky he didn't lose his leg.

I'll bet!


But FWIW the one I posted a pic of, though he was an Eastern Diamondback, was 19 inches around, and had three rabbits in him, though you couldn't tell till I skinned him.


I just can't figure out how I hunted these things for 35 years in half a dozen states and I'm the ONLY human on the planet who has never seen a 9 footer!



Course, I find since I started hunting in Texas that I'm the ONLY hunter there who has never killed a #450 hog...

It has taken me two days to work up the nerve to open this thread...the fact that the crew in the video didn't kill that bastard is reason enough ban all Mexicans from immigrating to the US. No civilized people would allow that monster to live.

The biggest buzzworm I've ever seen was in the Panhandle by Ogallala. Sucker was crawling across the road at a rest stop. He was about 4' and as thick as my wrist. I pointed him out to my dear, little wife and...Gawd!, you should have heard the screaming and weeping! The most embarrassing part was when she told me to shut up and get down off the roof of the truck, and that I was causing a scene....

I found a picture of ingwe doing him in on the internet.

I’ve killed a lot of these rascals. Several around and a little over 6 feet long. The biggest I’ve ever saw was in George West , Texas. We had a lease a little ways from the Nueces River. We were driving down a Jeep trail on a cross fence.
When we saw it , my first thought was there was a tree a cross the trail. It was a cross the road and the cleared area on both sides of the trail. The diameter really impressed me. Never gave me a chance to shoot it. Crawled under the fence and into some brush. Hasbeen

I've never killed a 450 either. Wife shot one with her bow that bottomed our 350 pound scale. I bet by not much though.

That said I did get an arrow in the lungs of a sow that was at least 450. We had some in pens wild caught, that the ranch hands used for breeding for food. They had scales, IIRC the biggest was a bit over 800 and I knew what 500 looked like. The pigs with her made trailing hard enough and I finally lost that trail. I';ve had hard time finding similar situations where the adrenalin the sow has must keep them going a LONG ways due to the young ones. A shame. I'd have liked to found her for a cape at least even if she was likely to old and tough to eat.

Most pigs shot are 80 to 130 appx IMHO.

the real deal

Look more closely. The snake crawls over a rock that is in front of the bus.