Rattle bug questions

[125Dad]

What’s the best advice for when you walk up one?
Freeze , run like the wind , back away slow or just pass out.

I have only been in this situation once. He coiled up but just as quick went on his way.

Thanks

[txwhitetail]

Slap them and show em whos boss. They normally limp off peacefully.

[twosixteens]

Unload your firearm/sling all your arrows at it and then run away screaming like a little school girl. Or just walk around it and go on about your business.

[mikeyb_23]

Kill'em

[Worksalot]

This is why you should always carry a 5 gallon jug of gasoline and matches on your person.

[rocky]

PoI.

[150class]

Stop and slowly back away unless you are armed

Been wanting to run into one lately as the wife snagged a new Sony A7IIIR and would love to get some coiled photos

[brokeno]

Find something and kill it.

[BrandonA]

Depending on situation but usual response is jump my *** back.

[BearStrike2010]

Hump it till it pees to show it who's boss

[smitgonhunting]

This is why you should always carry a 5 gallon jug of gasoline and matches on your person.

This is classic!

[xman59]

grab him by the tail swing him around and pop his head off,,, then then do it again an hold the rattle and pop the rest of his body off,, pocket the rattle

[KactusKiller]

You sure are worried about that one little snake.
Thought I had taught you well enough by now.

[El Viejo]

Whenever I've come across one, if I don't know exactly where it is, I freeze until I can locate it. Once I know where it is, I will slowly back away from it. If I feel like I or someone else is in immediate danger, I'll pop it with rat shot. If not, I'll let it go on its merry way.

[RifleBowPistol]

Really depends on the situation. I stepped on one once, it struck at me hit some loose denim, made a nice loud pop, scared the crap out of me. That time, I did the longest standing long jump in the history of man, off of one foot. Then spun around and shot the snake.

Other times, I have chased rattlers with a claw hammer whacking their heads into the ground about three inches. I smashed ones head flat, with a large mesquite limb once. I did a funky spinning dance looking move, one time. I was walking in the dark, with the light off, then as I turned the light on, just for the heck of it, I saw my right foot was about to come down right on top of a rattler coiled up in a old cattle trail, I was following. Once I had a second to make sure I was fine, I went back looking for the snake and put a 22 in it's head.

One time my brother and I were picking up a box blind, that was attached to a stand. It and a couple other blinds got blown over by a tornado, that went through the area. As we are picking the blind up I saw, we were disturbing a rattler, that had gotten under the blind to get out of the sun. I dropped the blind, jumped back, while yelling rattler. My brother dropped the blind and jumped back also. We rolled the blind over and the snake slithered right back under the blind, so we rolled it over again, it went right back under the blind. Eventually, it got tired of us uncovering it and slithered off towards the brush, that's when I reached into the bed of the truck, grabbed the claw hammer, chased it down and smashed it's head into the ground. After we got that blind up and went to check others, we found two more rattlers, within 100 yards. I jumped out and chased both of those and planted their heads in the ground. My brother was mad, he wanted to shoot them, they were not hanging around for him to get the rifle case out from behind the seat, then get the rifle out of the case, then get it loaded.


I put a broad head through the head of a rattler that was about the strike at a buddies leg, once. We were walking along a dry creek bottom, heard something drop and hit the creek bottom. It was a very hot dry day. Did not think anything of the noise, that I heard, when the snake dropped to the creek bottom. The sides of the creek were straight walls, about 7 ft. deep. Shortly after hearing something drop, I was looking around, my buddy was to my right and slightly ahead of me. I saw the rattler slithering right across in front of my buddy, my buddy was looking up at the top of the creek bank. As he was about to take another step, the snake coiled and was about to strike, when it sank in, what I was seeing. This all happened pretty quickly. I grabbed him by the back of the shirt collar and yanked him back, kind of threw him back. He started to get mad. Almost in one motion, I had yanked him back, grabbed the string and drew the bow and shot the snake in the head. I used to do a lot of instinctive shooting, it paid off that day.


I have heard people say you should freeze, when you see a snake, sometimes it may be the right thing to do. Sometimes, just getting away from them as fast as possible is the best thing to do. I have had many encounters with rattlers and moccasins, only that one time I stepped on the rattler, I may have been bitten, some people think I did actually get hit by that snake and it just did not release any venom or it had no venom at the time. I really don't know, just know it scared the crap out of me and I was sure I had been struck and was a long ways away from help and had no phone or vehicle to get to the nearest town about 20 miles away. I got lucky that day, weather it missed me or it just did not inject venom. On another occasion, I stepped on a moccasin and stood on it for a while, before I realized there was a problem. I was looking for a hog, I had heard moving in some thick brush, that's what I was focused on, turns out I was standing on a moccasin. Lucky for me, I had some heavy hunting boots on and where I stepped on the snake, limited it to being only able to strike about 4" up my boot. After standing on the snake for a while, I realized something was thumping my right boot, I looked down and saw I was standing on a moccasin, that was not happy at all. I took the arrow off of my bow and slapped the snakes head with the arrow, thinking it would stun the snake, but it cut the snakes head in half.

I have gotten very lucky many times, I hope my luck holds, when it comes to snakes. A few years ago, I almost got nailed on my right hand. I tried to grab a sun flower plant to get a clear view of a rattler that had just slithered off the driveway, into the pasture. As I grabbed the sun flower plant, the snake struck and came way too close to getting my hand. I don't know how I saw it strike, but I did and drew my hand back quickly, the snake nailed the sun flower plant, right where my hand had been. It was dark at the time. I had been trying to keep the snake in the driveway and in the head lights, while my wife brought a gun, but the snake realized something was up and slithered off into the tall grass in the pasture. Then I stupidly tried to keep it in sight, while in the dark, with no flashlight. I had gotten to the point, I lost most of my fear of the things, because I have killed so many in ways most people would not. Then that snake almost got me. Made me realize, I should be more careful around those things, I am not near as fast or agile as I used to be. I did not think that snake could strike as far as it did, it was at least 2 ft. from the sunflower plant, then it hit the plant about 1 1/2 ft. from the ground. So it had a pretty long reach, too long for me to try and kill it with a claw hammer. It don't matter how old you are, if you get bit, you are going to be in for a long painful recovery.