Picked the wife up from work today and on arriving home found Jr out of breath and tears down his face. Immediately I was ready for any threat and then saw he was laughing like a hyena at an elephant carcass.

He got home about 10 minutes before we did and found the following: the Jack Russell terrier was hyterical at a snake on the porch with the husband of our maid standing armed with a spade trying to get the snake. Every time the snake struck, the dog and the husband took 3 quick paces in succession to get away from the serpant. Then the snake, the dog and the husband would approach each other again with the same result. It was almost like the one shoving the other out the way to see who could get as far away as quickly as possible. The real funny part were the 3 onlookers who also made giant leaps of faith to get away from any possible snake and they were at least 10 yards away from the action. Wish I had a video camera then.

By the time Jr parked his car the spade made deep grooves into the rinkhals and it was rather dead in a few seconds. They severed the head to make very sure no amount of CPR would revive it.

A quick conversion showed the rinkhals to be 62" from tip to toe. The rinkhals is a highly venomous cobra type snake with neuro-toxin venom.

I do not like to kill, or to have snakes killed and would probably have tried to catch this one rather than kill it if I were at home.


The head that was separated from the body.


This is how thick it used to be.


Jr with the rinkhals


The rinkhals cremation

Catch I like the way it got caught myself Pieter!

They can go through the branches of a tree about like a fish swims through the water.

I do not automatically kill every snake either. Although some end up with Elvis for bad behaviour. It's really up to the snake most of the time.

I had a business Partner for many years, (MW) who's son was bitten in the face by a cobra in his bed under the blankets when he was only 4 years old. Poor little boy was taken by helicopter and nearly died. However the Anti Venom works and he was fine only a few days later. This species was both Neuro and Cytotoxic toxic the venom did destroy some of tissue of his upper lip.

That one was also dispatched for bad behaviour. It was quite difficult to find in the house as well. We were on pins and needles trying to find it to identify species and of course to make the house safe. Is was found up inside the curtains of a window eventually. Freddies Parents went to the hospital with him, while myself and a couple of the staff scoured the home in search of the serpent!

During the search we let in the pet Cheetah and the two little Jack Russell's to help and I guess become sacrificial to the effort. The Cheetah went to the kitchen and laid down to sleep, worthless cat. We led it into the rooms to be searched and closed the door to keep it inside.

We figured there would be a big commotion inside as a give away once the snake was found. I have never heard of a Jack Russell being bit by a snake. I think they are faster then the strike. I have seen them corner and taunt snakes plenty of times. Funny dogs they are. They truly believe they are 10 feet tall and weigh 2000lbs.

cobras, when they rear up atleast, are horribly slow strikers.....hell a person is faster then them let alone a JRT....its part of the reason they were a favorite of snake charmers....on top of "standing up" and being impressive looking so long as your full attention was on them it was near impossible to get bit even though it looks like your in danger....

Yep, Jack Russell's do think of themselves like that.

Of course, so did I in my earlier years - when I had a snootfull of tequila.

John

Don't get me wrong gents I don't kill every snake I see but the venomous kind around the house get dispatched...and all we have are prairie rattlers here

im not a snake killer but if yah dont know what your doing with moving them it is just best to kill the venomous kind that are near the house.....were one of those prairie rattlers to tag you Keith you can rack up $70k in hospital bills real quick even if things go ok.....if yah have a bad reaction to the antivenin then costs really start to climb

I live where there are only garter and ribbon snakes. I dont like them and smile every time one gets hit by the tractor mower. There is one in my pool house that three years ago was only 2.5ft and is now 6ft. That sends the shivers up and down me every time I see it. I dont know how you fellows deal with the poisonous kinds so calmly. My hat's off to you all.

Interesting. Those snakes common across RSA? All year? I'm going to Cathcart and Morgan Bay in mid May 2014. Any snakes out at that time?

snakes are common in South Africa, however most people hunt down ther during their winter which actually gets cold enough at night that the snakes do more or less go dormant so most hunters from the US rarely see any.....

Same here. If it's venomous, it dies, period.

I hate snakes...

Pretty much so but you are more prone to find black mamba's, green mamba's, puff adders, Cape cobra's, Gaboon adders, berg adders, many-horned adders, horned adders, Eastern bark snakes, Peringuey's adder, Southwestern shovel snout, common night adder and spotted house snakes.

They are of course all edible but it is advised not to eat the head or to stand on one of those. When startled the Peringuey adder actually bites onto it's tail and rolls down a hillside like a bicycle wheel in pursuit of the cause of it's disturbance. Hope you are going to hunt the flats in Cathcart.

Have fun

I knew this thread was bad juju...we had a freakin blizzard with 28" of snow on Oct 3 PM thru Oct 5 AM. I go out antelope hunting today and I encounter 2 of the freakin prairie rattlers...they have gone to better place...

those guys are pretty:

Not sure what you mean about the Cathcart flats. Will be hunting a property near Cathcart, and a property near Adelaide. Kudu, gemsbok, blue wildebeest, impala, and springbok, mountain reedbuck, blesbok and zebra. Or whatever combination fits the budget, presents itself and turns a fancy.

I truly believe the statement in the Bible about the serpent trying to bite my heel and me trying to bruise his head. It says 'serpent' not poisonous or non-poisonous snakes and all snakes are serpents to me. Don't like them, scared of them so I kill all of them I come in contact with if I possibly can.

My dog Luger got spit in the eyes by mozambique spitting cobras 3 times to date. We find them around the farm house on a regular basis. They are extremely venomous. I do not like to kill any snake but one stayed in a hole right next to the back door and I would rather kill the snake than waiting for a child, dog or client to get bit and it ending up in an emergency 100km from the closest hospital. It is quite special to see any of the venomous snakes in the veld and after all they have more right to be there than we do

Here is a pic of my dog that thinks he can take on the Mozam spitting cobras


Pieter

My Son and I were up near Messina this past June on an 11 day hunting trip (great time had by all) The PH said that the weather should be cool enough to keep the snake sightings at a minimum (fine by us) Well thanks to the earlier rains there was still lots of vegetation and it was still pretty warm. Well that combination led us to 4 run ins with snakes, 3 Black Mamba's and a Puff Adder. I always thought that if I had to I could just out run a snake, that was until I saw the 12 foot Black Mamba cruising about 10 miles per hour with his head 3 feet off the ground, luckily away from us. I learned very early in the hunt to LISTEN TO OUR PH!!!

Luger is a cute dog!

With two young kids around any rattlesnake near the house gets killed. Usually with my 20 gauge, but I used my little .32acp a few weeks ago. We see more bull snakes than anything else and they are left alone. Rattlesnakes are given no quarter.

good plan on the bullsnakes....you have snakes around cause you have rodents around.....best way to keep rattlesnakes away is to have bullsnakes cause they are more efficient mousers than the rattlers.....generally around here where i find lots of bullsnakes i dont find many rattlers....

they were in a pissy mood...

12 foot black mamba cruising at 10 mph with his head three feet off the ground.

Think all my Africa dreams just died.

That is certainly true. I have four JRTs here in Japan, according to the breeder papers originally from Australian descent. They particularly go crazy at night when the wild pigs (inoshishi) come through the neighborhood from the mountain forest preserve a few blocks away. Since our yard is fenced, they are kept out of trouble, though I've seen them climb the fence when they wanted.

My son and I have been out walking the leashed dogs when a pig passed by on the street within ten feet of us. All four dogs gave it their strict attention but in that case did not bark. They were MUCH smaller than the pig and the close proximity perhaps made that clear to them. Or maybe being on leashes kept them under control.

We seem to have two main kinds of snakes in Japan, at least in the Kansai area, the mamushi, which is a smallish, thick poisonous viper, and the harmless rat snake. I've never encountered a mamushi, but we have seen a few rat snakes somewhat longer than a meter around the house since there is much forest here.
They do no harm and so we discourage the dogs from messing with them.

Thanks AB. These Parsons Russel Terriers are great dogs and they have quite an ability to track wounded animals. We have a GSP as well and he do not tend to mess with snakes like the Parsons terrier.

Pieter

I have no mercy for venomous snakes around my dwellings. Never want to risk a bite to family, pets, or livestock. "Off with their heads"! Part of taming the land. I'll hatch a few owls to eat the mice.

Bare feet, poisonous snakes. JFHC, that gives me the willies.

its a cobra, its gonna bite you bout knee or thigh height anyway

Yeah, but it's that thick, musculular spasm right under your bare foot, as you realize - uh, oh, I've just stepped on a bloody cobra - that makes me a little queasy.

m77,



Upon what do you base this statement?

I appreciate places where people have not messed with nature. Snakes forms part of the ecological system and they are there for some reason. I think everything around us in our hunting environment should be protected in some way or another, as it forms part of the experience. Thousands of snakes burns to death annually in South-Africa in uncontrolled fires set by humans, by killing more of them intentionally cannot be a good thing. I do understand that in todays world we need to manage wildlife for animals to survive but we have to do it with care and only hunt/remove the right of amount of animals as even in todays world we see that some species becomes extinct.

Pieter

m77,

Sadly, animals become extinct every year. In your eloquent paragraph you didn't answer the question.

Ringman. Maybe my initial words was not chosen correctly. Somehow they made sense when I posted it I just feel if animals/reptiles have settled somewhere in an untouched environment we should treat it with care, even though we are hunters we should still look after the whole 'system' . Sorry for the confusion as I should have put it differently when I first posted the words.

We are lucky enough to have such a place and we try to look after it as best as we can.

Pieter

The best snake is a dead snake. Especially the venomous ones.

Amen, brother Bill!

Amen X2!

Amen #3!

anything around my house endangers my family is dead. No questions asked. Thats the way I feel it should be.

Good job.

Kinda cool looking snake though.

I'd have not creamated him though, I"d have let him out for nature to take its course, could have fed some other critters in its death.

Jeff