Rattlesnakes while hunting

[Dunning Kruger]

If you told me unit A was loaded with grizzly and unit B was full of snakes I'm going head first into unit A no question. I dont know what it is but I am deathly afraid of snakes!

Have fun, ill be hunting unit C

 

[Nick87]

Have fun, ill be hunting unit C

Have fun, ill be hunting unit C

Not a bad call.

 

[azelkhntr]

I don’t mind snakes too much but I generally ignore them. They do come in useful sometimes though...View attachment 141236

That is amazing work. I love it. How did you do that?

 

[Irishman]

I've never got to see one - thank God. I hate snakes. I hunt in areas with Grizzly bears, but avoid areas with snakes.

 

[Deleted member 38069]

I have let several pass while hunting. One was in the Black Hills at 6,300 ft. I let him be because it was a 3D shoot and I needed all of my arrows. While bird hunting, it's a different story. Nothing messes with my dog! Same goes for badgers and porcupine. Half the time, I'm more worried about his well being that I forget the shooting part!

 

[IdahoBugler]

Snake Karma is real!!!! Ask Randy what would typically happen after we let a snake go on it's merry way. It usually resulted in a monster antelope coming home with us. So its got to be real, right. I remember all those hunts @Big Fin like they were yesterday. Such a good time. Great pics by the way.

 

[WyoDoug]

A recipe I copy and pasted from another page:

Fried Rattlesnake | Kent Rollins - Cowboy Cooking

See how to make a fried rattlesnake soaked in buttermilk, coated with milk & egg and a dry mixture, and we’re going to fry it till it’s nice and crispy.

kentrollins.com

Fried Rattlesnake - Cowboy Kent Rollins




Ingredients

• Snake meat
• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• ½ cup yellow cornmeal
• 1 tablespoon mesquite seasoning available kentrollins.com or your favorite seasoning blend
• ½ teaspoon cayenne
• 1 teaspoon onion powder
• 2 teaspoons garlic powder
• 2 tablespoons cornstarch
• 1 cup milk
• 2 large eggs
• Fry oil

Instructions

1. For fresh snake meat, clean the snake well and cover it in buttermilk overnight.
2. Drain the snake from the buttermilk and cut into about 3 to 4-inch pieces.
3. In a medium bowl, combine the dry ingredients.
4. In a separate bowl, whisk together the milk and eggs.
5. Dip the snake pieces in the milk mixtures to coat well then dredge through the flour mixtures to generously coat. Repeat to double coat.
6. Heat about 2-inches deep of fry oil in a Dutch oven or deep fryer to 350 degrees Fry a few pieces of the snake at a time until golden brown. Drain and let cool on a paper towel. Serve with dipping sauce.
7. For the dipping sauce: Whisk together 2 tablespoons mayonnaise, 1 tablespoon honey and ½ teaspoon liquid smoke.

I do something like this but I use Panka breadcrumbs myself and I don't use any cornstarch. I coat them in milk and egg mix then I cover with flour, dip in milk/egg mixture and roll in bowl of bread crumbs. Sometimes I bake them, other times I deep fry. The bread crumbs I also add spices and don't always follow a recipe so they come out different.

 

[slatebuilder]

They are pretty cool critters, but I leave them alone. Once in gobbler season I was less than a step from one. He was coiled up motionless and quiet in the leaves. The quiet ones are the ones that make me nervous, and I wonder how many times I have been within a step of one and didn’t know it. Last spring on a Sunday morning my brother and I hiked into a place for coffee and breakfast at sun up. There was a pile of logs laying there that we sat on and had our little breakfast, we snapped a few landscape pictures and left. On the way out we ran into the trail clearing crew. They were both fellas we happened to know, we talked with them a bit. They were going to cut the log pile we had sat on for breakfast up into firewood for hikers. The next morning I got the following pictures from one of them. They had started to cut up the log pile and on the first cut found the snake in the pictures below, though they didn’t actually see it until the 3rd or 4th cut. Literally the snake was inches from my feet as I sat there. They had nicked it with the saw but it appeared to be ok. They used a stick to move it out of the way.


This one was hanging out on a township road one evening. I snapped a picture and moved on.

 

[Western Traveler1]

They are pretty cool critters, but I leave them alone. Once in gobbler season I was less than a step from one. He was coiled up motionless and quiet in the leaves. The quiet ones are the ones that make me nervous, and I wonder how many times I have been within a step of one and didn’t know it. Last spring on a Sunday morning my brother and I hiked into a place for coffee and breakfast at sun up. There was a pile of logs laying there that we sat on and had our little breakfast, we snapped a few landscape pictures and left. On the way out we ran into the trail clearing crew. They were both fellas we happened to know, we talked with them a bit. They were going to cut the log pile we had sat on for breakfast up into firewood for hikers. The next morning I got the following pictures from one of them. They had started to cut up the log pile and on the first cut found the snake in the pictures below, though they didn’t actually see it until the 3rd or 4th cut. Literally the snake was inches from my feet as I sat there. They had nicked it with the saw but it appeared to be ok. They used a stick to move it out of the way.

Did you count his rattles? Looks like 15!
I’ve encountered a lot of rattlesnakes over the years. So far I prefer to live around the Prairie rattlers over the Pacific Diamondback, Mohave, and Sidewinders of the Southwest. Those have always seemed more aggressive to me. I had one swimming across a lake swim into my boat and another while parked on a sandbar on the Lower Colorado River climb into the outboard well on my bass boat. I swam up to the stern and pulled myself up and there it was. That one I let go. The one that swam into the boat with us got the oar...

 

[diamond hitch]

I believe in selective breeding. If they are aggressive and irritable - they die. If they are timid and reclusive -I urge them on their way. This is in hopes that a type of timid reclusive rattlesnake will evolve.

 

[bowhuntmontana]

I've run into a bunch of them over the years. I've killed a few, but left most of them alone. Ran into one last year at close to 8,500 ft in an aspen stand in August. Last thing I expected to see there, and he didn't even have the decency to warn me.

The highest concentrations I find are in prairie dog towns, sometimes bumping into several snakes crossing a 2 acre town.

I see a bunch of them on early October antelope hunts any time the temps get north of 60. Here's your hot tip of the day: Did you know it's pretty hard to hear them buzzing when the wind is blowing 30+ miles per hour? It is. It becomes a test of visual acumen.

 

[Gr8bawana]

The quiet one are the most worrisome for sure. Several years ago we were bowhunting in Aug. here in NV and my son and I sat several hundred yards apart in chairs overlooking a stand of quakies near a waterhole. When I walked over to where my son was after shooting hours we were gathering up his stuff and there was a rattler coiled up not 10 feet from where his chair was. It never made a sound and we left it where it was.

 

[Harrier]

One morning while hunting javelinas in West Texas, I was just thinking that I needed to watch out for snakes because it was warming up, and I nearly stepped on this one.

 

[Clam]

So, does anyone here have experience with being bitten?

I taunted a prairie rattler with a stick after I accidentally drove over it with my RZR and it struck back.

 

[Kaitum]

The color variations in all the species is cool, great pics! I've never seen a rattlesnake while hunting. I've looked, I just haven't hunted many areas they inhabit. Constrictors on the other hand.... Thought I was going to have to rescue Barley from this rubber boa while hunting morels one year

 

[Dunning Kruger]

The color variations in all the species is cool, great pics! I've never seen a rattlesnake while hunting. I've looked, I just haven't hunted many areas they inhabit. Constrictors on the other hand.... Thought I was going to have to rescue Barley from this rubber boa while hunting morels one year

The rubber boa, the most dangerous reptile known to man.... your dog is lucky to have survived!

 

[Jim/Wa]

That is amazing work. I love it. How did you do that?

That’s an Osage self bow (the other is hickory). Once the skins are dried, they’re attached with hide glue then sealed with polyurethane.

 

[brownbear932008]

Again I'd rather fight a grizz and I kinda am serious about that. Yes I'm that terrified of those dang things. Once it is warm enough for the copperhead and timber rattlers here I'm out of the woods until October frost unless it's a nice wide hiking trail.

 

[Dunning Kruger]

Again I'd rather fight a grizz and I kinda am serious about that.

I can kick a rattlesnakes ass with a big stick or a rock. Grizzly... well it would be a close match.

 

[Dunning Kruger]

We've had a few encounters with rattlers over the years but didn't take many pics. I've seen them as high as about 8,000 ft in the Ruby's of NV. We seen them pretty regularly when dove hunting in the desert near waterholes.
We found this guy during an Aug. bowhunt in southern NV. He was under a bush right next to the only water we could find for miles around probably waiting for a small meal to come get a drink.

View attachment 141224

Thats a really cool looking rattler, cant say ive ever even seen a pic of one with a similar color and pattern. Is that typical in nevada?