Someone would post another hunting story here. :D

Dave :cool:

Someone would post another hunting story here. :D

Dave :cool:
How about two rattlesnake stories.

When I was about 16 years old, me and a friend were bow hunting a pasture during October. That time of year, the days are still hot, cooling down in the evening.
Anyway, my friend, Carl, let me out of the truck, and I started to walk to my stand. As I stepped over a log, I looked down in time to see what looked like a cow patty by the log. It was too late to retract my foot, and the rattler came back and struck me on the instep of my left boot.
Well, fear set in, I called to my friend, who had gotten out of the truck by that time. All I could holler was,"Rattlesnake"

As I took my boot off, I felt my whole leg going numb, but the bite did not penetrate the boot. One fang was in the boot, and there was a wet spot, but it did not penetrate.
My friend Carl was not so lucky. On the way back to get me in the truck, he was driving so fast, he hit a chuck hole in the road and bloodied his lip on the steering wheel.

The boots were Irish Setters. I still wear Irish Setters, and have a deep respect for rattlesnakes. We decided to not hunt that evening.



#2, Three years ago, we all hit camp at the same time on Friday night. We started a fire as soon as we got there. There is a big wood pile by the campfire. All night, we kept pulling wood off of the pile and putting it on the fire. By midnight, we were down to the last of the wood, one guy went to get more wood and screamed, "rattlesnake"
Seems that the snake had been there all along, just crawling deeper in the pile as we kept pulling wood off. He was about
10 feet away, right in the middle of 5 guys all evening.

I guess if you hunt long enough, things like this happen to you

Good Luck, and watch out for snakes!
Tom

A couple summers ago I was working as a Rangemaster at the local gunrange.

A weather front came through with very strong winds in that area and caused a bunch of plastic bagged aluminun cans awaiting transport to the salvage yard to be blown apart and scattered all over the range proper.

Being one who dislikes litter in the extreme, an old broom was found, the handle sawn off and a nail driven into one end. Found a broken stub of a file and filed a nice point to the nail, and with new bags tucked under the belt, set out to clean up the mess, like a trash collector in a city park.

All was going well until the last area to be cleaned was the head of a wash behind the office building. It was choked with brush and weeds, but contained a lot of cans. Slipping gingerly into it, I was making pretty good headway with the cans, plucking them from under scrub and weeds while standing with one foot uphill and the other down. Did I mention how hot it was doing this? My uniform clothes (shirt and knee length shorts) were getting damp and clingy.

Speared a can under small Palo Verde tree and immediately heard a fizzing sound. Thought I'd stabbed a full can, but noticed it was pretty light on the end of the stick and no liquid was running out of the hole. The fizzing got more intense so I looked where the can had been - only to see a large coon tail rattler coiled with head and part of body raised, weaving back and forth about 4 feet from my bare knobby kneed leg!

Standing on the severe slope, there was only one way to jump out of the situation - that was to bound down further into the brushy wash. A prospect that didn't really appeal to me, envisioning it fully infested with more snakes.

Verrrrrrrry slowly, keeping the aluminum can decorated stick between me and the snake, I stepped carefully uphill in sideways steps until getting out and back on level ground by the office. Now, normally I'll always give snakes the right-of-way to go on about their business, as they are good rodent control and we had an abundance of pack rats on the range. However, this one was just a little close to the office and the general firing range, so I felt it should be dealt with. Besides - it scared the #@&* out of me and I wanted revenge!

Went to my truck to fetch the common truck gun (S&W Mod 16 Combat Masterpiece .38 Spl) and returned to make a good snake out of the beast, just in time to see about 5 feet of snake fast disappearing down the wash, still rattling a stiffly upheld tail. Since it was smart enough to skedaddle away (for the time being), decided to leave it alone.

Continued carefully poking under brush and weeds collecting cans, but with a revolver strapped to the hip and a very watchful eye, ready to jump at the slightest sound. Never saw the snake or his relatives again that day, much to my and the other Rangemaster's relief.

A couple summers ago I was working as a Rangemaster at the local gunrange.

A weather front came through with very strong winds in that area and caused a bunch of plastic bagged aluminun cans awaiting transport to the salvage yard to be blown apart and scattered all over the range proper.

Being one who dislikes litter in the extreme, an old broom was found, the handle sawn off and a nail driven into one end. Found a broken stub of a file and filed a nice point to the nail, and with new bags tucked under the belt, set out to clean up the mess, like a trash collector in a city park.

All was going well until the last area to be cleaned was the head of a wash behind the office building. It was choked with brush and weeds, but contained a lot of cans. Slipping gingerly into it, I was making pretty good headway with the cans, plucking them from under scrub and weeds while standing with one foot uphill and the other down. Did I mention how hot it was doing this? My uniform clothes (shirt and knee length shorts) were getting damp and clingy.

Speared a can under small Palo Verde tree and immediately heard a fizzing sound. Thought I'd stabbed a full can, but noticed it was pretty light on the end of the stick and no liquid was running out of the hole. The fizzing got more intense so I looked where the can had been - only to see a large coon tail rattler coiled with head and part of body raised, weaving back and forth about 4 feet from my bare knobby kneed leg!

Standing on the severe slope, there was only one way to jump out of the situation - that was to bound down further into the brushy wash. A prospect that didn't really appeal to me, envisioning it fully infested with more snakes.

Verrrrrrrry slowly, keeping the aluminum can decorated stick between me and the snake, I stepped carefully uphill in sideways steps until getting out and back on level ground by the office. Now, normally I'll always give snakes the right-of-way to go on about their business, as they are good rodent control and we had an abundance of pack rats on the range. However, this one was just a little close to the office and the general firing range, so I felt it should be dealt with. Besides - it scared the #@&* out of me and I wanted revenge!

Went to my truck to fetch the common truck gun (S&W Mod 16 Combat Masterpiece .38 Spl) and returned to make a good snake out of the beast, just in time to see about 5 feet of snake fast disappearing down the wash, still rattling a stiffly upheld tail. Since it was smart enough to skedaddle away (for the time being), decided to leave it alone.

Continued carefully poking under brush and weeds collecting cans, but with a revolver strapped to the hip and a very watchful eye, ready to jump at the slightest sound. Never saw the snake or his relatives again that day, much to my and the other Rangemaster's relief.

Snakes make my legs turn to jello.
Anyone who has been in the woods long enough is going to have a close call. And if you haven't had one yet,,,look out!!!

I've nearly stepped on two rattlesnakes.... just FYI they're not bad eating - all ribs thought :)

Dave, I went hunting this past Monday. I took a fellow out that wanted to try to shoot a turkey with his M92 38-40 loaded up with his home cast bullets and blackpowder.

I've been flying a lot and was pretty tired when I met him. I put him out in the pasture... there was a lot of weather blowing through... so I crawled up in a tower blind to get out of the wind and rain. In that I had corned all my roads with my tailgate feeder, a little pack of 5 javelina's came out on the road and where feeding at the base of the stand. That corn crunching actually put me right to sleep and I slept two hours!

When I woke up, they where gone so I went on about my business of shooting some raccoons, skunks and others that eat turkey eggs.

I've nearly stepped on two rattlesnakes.... just FYI they're not bad eating - all ribs thought :)
you can eat them_

Dave...

I quess you are having withdrawal symtoms from the hunt?

Rattlers are a funny critter being from west Texas sometimes it seems that you can go a year or two without seeing one....but this year while dove hunting we managed to kill four of them...needless to say this ole boy wears thick boots and gators. I've been wanting to get one of those Bond derringers with the 3.5 barrel that will shot either 45 long colt or a 3" 410 shotshell for a snakegun and it will fit nicely in a pocket to get to.

David

I've only met one rattler face to face,in a lifetime,but I remember it well.
It was in 1965 0r 66;before rattlesnakes became endangered species.
Three of us,along with one fellow's son,were shooting civil war replica rifles at our range.We had each fired a round,and were yaking it up while reloading,when a large rattlesnake came out of the old stone wall(built around 1939).
I was the closest to him;about 20 feet away.He came right at me.I decided to make a stratigic withdrawl.just asfast as I could get up from sitting,and run like a bunny.
One man had his gun loaded,and fired at the snake;but missed.The other man had the presence of mind to get his son's 22 semi auto rifle,and shoot the snake.
I recovered enough to find a stick to pin the snake and cut it's head off,to everyone's satisfaction.
It was 43 inches longextending the entire width of the interior of my 1965 Chevelle station wagon.
Frank

Dave...

I quess you are having withdrawal symtoms from the hunt?
__________________________________________________ _____

RanchDog,

Not at all. I am extremely fired up, excited about our hunt and am still refreshed from it. Just been sorta busy and lazy about posting something that I have to think about before I write. :) The crunching corn certainly didn't put me to sleep on the hunt. :D I wanna go again next week and the week after and the week after...you get the picture.

Dave