Timber Rattlesnake Encounter

On Labor Day we were sitting on the front porch at the river house talking about myths and misconceptions of snakes. I was just teaching Regina and Ashley about venomous snakes when all of a sudden Ashley yells, "There's a snake! It's swimming!" We look out at Black River and sure enough, there was a very large snake swimming across. What was really cool was the fact that this Timber Rattlesnake had a hitchhiking Lubber Grasshopper riding over on the snake's back.

Once on land we gave it some space and the Timber crawled right up the bank and allowed us to get great looks while keeping our distance. For 30 minutes we watched this snake make its way across the lawn and back into the swampy area behind the house. During the whole event the rattlesnake stayed stretched straight out and constantly moved in a beeline direction to the shady Cypress swamp.

It's hard to tell the size of a snake from some pictures but believe me this guy was a monster. I attached a photo at the bottom of the post to help give you some idea of the size. And also, check out that rattle of a tail. When the rest of my family came up to the house they couldn't understand why we didn't kill it. One, I didn't have anything to kill it with but two, I wouldn't have killed it unless someone was in danger. I know that when you live in the country that these guys can be dangerous around young children and pets but no one lives at the river house. Luckily, it was just the three of us at home when this snake decided to make a trip across the river. I was grateful to witness such a beautiful animal in its home territory.