Like most Africans (real ones born in Africa, not the phony Jesse Jackson kind), I have a fear and loathing of snakes. I’ve heard all the calls that they keep the rodent population down and all that, and if the slithery little bastards kept on doing just that, I’d be fine with them.
It is said to feel like two sharp nails being hammered into your skin – and we can reveal that deadly snake bites are rising dramatically in a trend that is worrying experts.
An Austrian man was the latest victim when he “felt a pinch in the genital area” while sitting on his toilet at home in Graz on Monday, according to a local police report.
Wait: Austrian? At first I read “Australian” (which would be nothing out of the ordinary) but was stopped by “Graz” (which isn’t in Australia). Sheesh, if the fucking things are in Austria, they could be anywhere. And they are.
Read the rest of the article, and I hope your breakfast has settled, because otherwise you’ll be heading off to the can to puke.
Just check before you do, though:
Brrrr… I fucking hate them.
Whenever there’s a chance that I’m about to walk anywhere remotely bush-y, I carry my little NAA Mini-Revolver, and it’s loaded with .22 Mag shotshells.
I once saw a video of a snake being shot with one of these, and it was excellent: in a split second, it went from being all hissy and strikey to totally limp — whereupon I bought about 500 rounds of the stuff.
Be careful out there.
Ranger Rick had a 10′ 4″ dick so he stuck it near the girl next door. She thought it was a snake, so she hit it with a rake, and now it’s only 2′ foot 4″.
Gramps had a .410 for the slithery bastages -had a copperhead problem in his potato patch. Come picking time, you could smell the cucumbers, and know they were out.
BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! Then things would go silent. About an half-hour later, Gramps would drag up a sack of spuds, shotgun on his shoulder, and go back down.
Read the whole gory story and it reenforces my opinion that snakes mostly bite stupid people, especially if they are men with ear rings and stuff. I have spent a lot of time outdoors hunting and fishing in Texas, Oklahoma and Colorado and I have killed a lot of snakes including rattle snakes and water moccasins. The water snakes do that flesh mortification stuff and I have seen hands on guys who screwed around and got bit. I wear boots when I am out anywhere besides my yard or on pavement and that’s the best way to avoid being bit, the second best is don’t screw around with the snakes, I read that here in Texas most snake bites are from young males trying to catch the snakes or just getting too close to them and shooting the snakes and then respecting the bitey parts of dead snakes is a good way to avoid being injured.
Cost of being bitten, a nine year old in Indiana at a summer camp was bitten on her toe while wearing sandals, resolution: The insurer negotiated down the antivenin and air ambulance charges and ended up paying $44,092.87 and $55,543.20, respectively. After adjustments to additional bills, the health plan paid a total of $107,863.33. ~~ https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2019/04/29/717467217/summer-bummer-a-young-campers-142-938-snakebite
Snakes are a fact of life in my part of Australia in summer. All asleep for the time being.
I keep an African sjambok in my pickup, one whack with that and the snake is history.
I also have three snakebite kits, one in the house, one in the workshop and one in the pickup, thankfully never been needed despite a close call or two (bitten on the back of the boot and one non-venomous).
Snakes have never bothered me. Spiders, on the other hand… if you hear someone shrieking like a little bitch, it’ll be me having encountered a spider.
Which isn’t to suggest that I’d ever cuddle up to a snake. This time of year I keep snake loads in my Colt Cobra.
You are not the only one. I do not like the creepy little bastards.
Snake or not, I’m avoiding that terlit.
Don’t particularly care for snakes (or spiders) but do admit to liking to watch them move. ‘specially the sidewinders. Spellbinding. Couple years ago I killed a copperhead and afterward wished I hadn’t. It caught me off guard and I reacted like a little bitch. I just grabbed a shovel and cut it’s head off. Yeah, they serve a purpose.
Opened my front door in Southern Arizona yesterday to find a coiled rattlesnake on the threshold who turned out to be three feet long. One CCI shot shell from my Ruger Single Six took care of the problem. Rattlers are more plentiful this year it seems.
you’re right about snakes. They can do their snake thing over there away from my house and people. I won’t jump into your snake business and they can stay away from my business. If they decide to invade my turf then they get capital punishment. Same goes for vermin, bugs, commies and other unwanted pests.
Generally I find that snakes move away if they detect a human coming and only fight or cause a problem if they are surprised and can’t get away.
JQ
I’ve been impressed by how polite the rattle snakes in my yard have been since I moved to semi-rural South Texas. All those I’ve encountered have coiled and rattled to let me know that they are there and are able to harm me. They were always waiting for me without moving after I went back to the house to get either a .410 or .22 with LR shot shells.
Then they politely died.
My small dachshund competently handles the coral snakes and scorpions. I’ve watched him handle scorpions and found the mutilated bodies of the coral snakes. He’s skilled.
I really don’t mind non-venomous snakes around the house. More power to them in eating up the various rodents. Venomous snakes are another matter, but it’s easy to distinguish venomous from non-venomous types. We used to catch non-venomous snakes when I was a kid. They calm down pretty quickly once they realize that (a) you’re not going to hurt them, and (b) that you’re warm (especially if you had to run them down in the woods).
I agree with slant-eyed polack, though, about spiders. And, sweet bleeding jeebus, the motherfucking spiders in the Philippines still give me the heeby-jeebies over 3 decades later!
The snakes in the Austrian part of that story were both pythons – nonvenomous constrictors, although certainly not native to Europe. Their byte is mainly to hold the prey while they wind around it to squeeze it to death. If a python bytes something too big to swallow – which any adult human is – it’s either very confused or scared and attacking to try to gain space to escape.
But that doesn’t mean the bytes are nothing to worry about. Reptiles don’t practice dental hygiene and often have rotten meat hanging from their teeth, so a nasty infection is likely.
“I don’t like spiders and snakes,
And that ain’t what it takes
to make me love you”
I’ll kill any snake or spider in my path with extreme prejudice. They started trouble in the garden of Eden and that’s when the fight broke out.