Editor:
I ran across an article in a neighborhood website regarding the concerns of a new resident finding a large snake in their back yard.
Someone quickly identified the snake as a member of either the Mamba, Cobra or Sea-Snake family! Well, maybe not! You find the Mamba in Africa, the Cobra in Asia, the Sea Snake in the Indian and Western Pacific Ocean. None in Georgia! Might be one in Fulton County.
The blurry picture is very possibly that of an Eastern Indigo, a black colored snake that gets very big. The record is a bit over 8 feet. They are non-aggressive. Give them a chance and they will make a run for it. They are very valuable to our ecology. For one thing, they eat mice and rats, as do most snakes. More importantly, they eat poisonous snakes! They are immune to the venom. Rest assured that the State of Georgia would literally be overrun with rats were it not for our snakes. kinda like New York City. Guess they don’t have any snakes.
There are only seven venomous type snakes in Southeast Georgia. There are 39 non-venomous types. Unless you are an expert on snakes the best thing is to leave them all alone! I am sure somebody has it all down, but I find it impossible to memorize the markings of 46 different snakes.
The non-poisonous Royal King Snake looks very much like the poisonous Coral Snake. There is the rhyme that sez, Black on yellow kills a fellow. It refers to the stripes on the snake, black, yellow and red. The comparatively harmless King Coral has black on red. Safe!
The wife and I were in Florida doing a tour of homes, all of which had swimming pools. At one house I observed a striped snake about eight inches long, desperately trying to find its’ way out of the pool. Let me see, black on red you are dead? That must be it! I got on my knees, grabbed the small snake at the back of his head and threw him over the fence.
Went to a wildlife display later and looked at the snakes. Yup, it was a coral!
Black on yellow kills a fellow!
We have copperhead snakes here. A very colorful pattern and a must have for anyone who collects snakes, which only experts should do! Fortunately, copperheads don’t have enough venom to kill you if you weigh over twenty pounds. A small dog can survive a copperhead bite with antihistamines.
I know a guy who, as a young man, collected snakes. He is an instructor at the UGA facility on Skidaway Island now. He told the story of finding a perfect specimen of a beautiful Copperhead Snake and had to have it for his collection. He didn’t have equipment to capture the snake. Not a problem.
He caught the snake at the back of its head, held it out the window of his car and drove home. He almost made it into his driveway before the snake bit him!
He said that the bite of a Copperhead may not kill you but you will wish you were dead.
Snakes are very valuable to us. Killing them is not a good thing. Certainly there are times when killing them is the only way to resolve a problem with a poisonous snake in your yard with the kids and the dog etc. If you take the time to learn what the seven poisonous snakes look like then perhaps you will be able to determine that the snake in your path is perhaps not one of them and deserves to left alone.
All snakes deserve to be left alone when possible.
They are generally non-aggressive and will disappear if the opportunity presents itself. lets’ talk about Buzzards.
We don’t have any. Those big black ugly looking birds you see along the side of the road are Vultures. Buzzards, their first cousins, live only in Europe. Our vultures provide a valuable service.
They are protected by the Migratory Bird act of 1918.
Look it up! You harm a protected bird and you are subject to heavy fines.
We have the Turkey Vulture and the Black Vulture.
The Turkey Vulture got its name for its red head. You will almost never see a Turkey Vulture along the road because they hunt by scent.
A carcass sends a spiraling trail of smell up into the air. The Turkey Vulture follows it down to the source. Usually in the woods The Black Vulture however hunts by sight and it looks for the carcass along roads. Both have excellent flying skills but are very clumsy and slow on the ground.
Contrary to a seeming popular belief, vultures have not attended engineering classes on the dynamics of a several thousand- pound vehicle coming at high speeds. It is up to human with good sense to slow down, blow your horn. Our beautiful but dumb squirrels are a good example. They cross roads constantly, especially neighborhood streets where cars are still doing 30 plus mph!
Squirrels get halfway and sense the vehicle coming at them. The person driving the car could care less.
It’s just a squirrel. I am a superior human being! It may be a mama squirrel fetching food for her dray or a young squirrel. The squirrel panics. Their first inclination when they sense danger is to go to their nest. They turn and run back in front of the car!
Deer usually move early morning or late afternoon.
There are often more right behind the first one. We are steadily destroying their habitant here along the coast.
They are often in a panic mode trying to deal with the cutting of trees, rumble of bulldozers, Coyotes and loose dogs. Slow down! Pay attention! Give the animals a chance to live.
Roy Hubbard