What breeds of Snakes are common near SoCal Streams?

[rayfound]

On Spenser and I's two-day adventure, I saw my first snake in the wild. It was a light tan color overall, and I am pretty sure I saw a distinct color change at the tail... but I was running the other way... so I guess I'm not really certain.

Also, I can't distinctively remember a "rattle" sound as I approached... but at the same time, I feel like I heard something that alerted me to look down. It wasn't a big snake (Maybe 24" or so), and when we saw each other, it slithered away in one direction, and I ran like a little girl in the other. Would a rattler have invariably coiled-up and "looked tall" upon seeing me?

Aaron's recent post about seeing snakes in the locals recently isn't helping my paranoia any....

Just how deadly are these things anyway? I understand there is a wide range of rattler species...

Would my breathable waders and hiking boots offer ANY protection from a bite?

Thanks,

Ray

[anacrime]

gopher snake prob.

rattlesnakes aren't deadly to 99% of people. just stop fishing, hike out, and go to the hospital. it's gonna hurt but unless you have an allergic reaction you're not gonna die.

i forget the exact number, but i think it's some where about 30% of the time an adult rattlesnake don't even inject venom upon biting, as they have no intention of eating you. the smaller ones can't control it though and are typically more likely to bite.

there has been many cases where people refuse treatment and end up being just fine.

more folks die from bee stings each year. black widows are more painful.

in other words, i'm more worried about losing a day of fishing by getting tagged than any serious injury

[briansII]

It's only a matter of time before they find you, then you're toast..................

Absolutely no way to id a snake that you didn't see clearly. Rattlers, and gopher snakes have similar colors. Not all rattlers will coil, and not all will rattle...when rattled. Rattlers, and snakes in general, seem to have individual personalities. I have poked, prodded and flipped a small rattler, and it never took a defensive/offensive posture, or rattled. It just wanted outta there. Out of the many, I have only seen a few rattlers that were coiled and ready to rumbled when I stumbled upon them. There are tales of Mojave Greens chasing people. Also, not all snake strikes have them injecting venom. If lucky, you'd only have puncture wounds. I think the multi layer waders would provide good - ok protection. Best protection is to make a lot of noise going through snake country, and just be aware....but IMHO, no reason to be paranoid. I think death from rattle snake bites is pretty rare.

I saw a snake swimming in a lake last weekend. I couldn't id it, because only the head was poking out of the water. When it got close, it submerged. I could see a small, spotted bass following it. I also saw a big butt toad out in the middle of the lake that night....not frog, but toad. I have no clue what it was doing out there.

briansII

[anacrime]

this is a good website for identifying reptiles and amphibs

http://www.californiaherps.com/index.html

i say gopher just b/c i've seen a ton where ray was and 11/12 rattlesnakes i saw in that area in the last two years were pacific rattlesnakes (dark color).

but yah, it could have been a rattler, but it's really hard to mis-ID one as they're body types are so distinct.

[briansII]

That is a really cool site. I bookmarked it. Thanks!!

Rattler color(species?) variations







Gopher



Garter



I've seen garter/water snakes have similar colors to rattlers. I also know folks mistake gopher snakes for rattlers. If you are not comfortable around snakes, and or startled, I think it's very difficult to make a positive id. Running and screaming like a girl seems the right way to go for snake challenged folks

briansII

[RubiKinda]

I'll add one more piece of advice. Don't mess with King Snakes.... they have a nasty bite. Not venomous, but really painful. They are super fast as well. I used to live in Lake Matthews (some of you 909'ers know this lake ) and my house was right in the middle of the Kangaroo Rat preserve. I had snakes everywhere and saw them just about daily. One night I had my brother Ryan and another friend come over to do some fishing at the lake ( I know it is illegal). After a few brews we started grabbing gear and I ran into a decent sized King Snake in the closet who was purely * off that I woke him up. Due to his bad attitude and a little liquid courage, we decided to take turns attempting to "Indiana Jones" him (grab the tail & crack his head on the floor). I don't think any of us ever even got a grab at his tail before 2 of us were bit. I ended up with a bite on my inner thigh ( within inches of my wife's wedding present) and my buddy with a nice one on his man boob. The bite was so strong it made a blood blister the size of a silver dollar. The pain lasted a couple days & looked nasty. And yes they have teeth. After that I run from King Snakes like a little girl.

[buggravy]

Also, I can't distinctively remember a "rattle" sound as I approached... but at the same time, I feel like I heard something that alerted me to look down.
Ray

Kind of depends on how close you were to the stream/how much ambient noise there was, but my guess is that you'd know if it rattled at you. I got rattled a couple years ago in more or less the same drainage you were in. I was crossing a boulder pile to leapfrog my fishing partner and got rattled from a snake that I never saw, but apparently was VERY close to. It was HOLY CRAP loud, and could not have been more distinct. I've also put my foot down within a foot of a coiled rattlesnake that never rattled. That was a pucker moment too.

[Benny]

You will definitely know when it's rattling, it's quite loud.

[gabe]

a nice gopher snake in the SB mountains


was surprised to find this little guy on my bike, almost didn't see it as I went to grab my bike. SG mountains


walked right over this little guy around the same area without even knowing


I've come across Kings, garters, gohpers, and western diamond backs.
I haven't come across too many in the last year. They sure do get my heart going when they catch me off guard. though they sure are a treat to see in the wild.
I've walked over rattlers and put my hand next to em without even knowing it till after the fact. Sure have had some close calls and have been lucky so far.
I think the baby ones are the worst. Can't hear em, and they won't hesitate to strike and release a crap load of venom

[fly addict]

I'll add one more piece of advice. Don't mess with King Snakes.... they have a nasty bite. Not venomous, but really painful. They are super fast as well. I used to live in Lake Matthews (some of you 909'ers know this lake ) and my house was right in the middle of the Kangaroo Rat preserve. I had snakes everywhere and saw them just about daily. One night I had my brother Ryan and another friend come over to do some fishing at the lake ( I know it is illegal). After a few brews we started grabbing gear and I ran into a decent sized King Snake in the closet who was purely * off that I woke him up. Due to his bad attitude and a little liquid courage, we decided to take turns attempting to "Indiana Jones" him (grab the tail & crack his head on the floor). I don't think any of us ever even got a grab at his tail before 2 of us were bit. I ended up with a bite on my inner thigh ( within inches of my wife's wedding present) and my buddy with a nice one on his man boob. The bite was so strong it made a blood blister the size of a silver dollar. The pain lasted a couple days & looked nasty. And yes they have teeth. After that I run from King Snakes like a little girl.

I’m surprised that a kingsnake would have that kinda attitude. They are about the mellowest snakes in the wild unless you smell like a rat. Now if it was a racer of some kind that’s a different story. They have a bad as attitude and if you corner one of those you have your hands full of one bad butt snake that will bit continually until you kill it or run away like a girl!

[darrin terry]

Gabe, nice gopher. Very nice snake.


I've had more bites from gopher snakes than any other. I used to catch snakes while growing up around Lompoc, CA. Gopher, garter, racer, king, ring neck snakes were always on the list. Rattlers were around but the only two I ever encountered I actually stepped on before seeing. They never rattled until I stepped on them. Both times the snakes were most of the way down a rodent hole in the ground as I stepped over a mound of dirt or a rock and put foot on them. No bites.

If you do manage to find yourself bit by a rattler, try to stay calm and get to a hospital. They may not kill you, but they can. Even if not, the chances of nasty effects are high. Rattler venom is in part doing damage by digesting your tissues. It is largely a modified form of digestive enzymes.

There are a few snakes in CA besides rattlers which are venomous, but they are not harmful to humans. The ring neck snake is an example. Harmless to you and me, but it does have a mild venom for frogs and such that it eats.

The Californiaherps site that Brian linked is excellent. Lots of great info there.

If you live in SoCal and get bit, I'd suggest trying to yourself to, I think its Loma Linda University Medical, I believe they have a resident venom expert. He's the one that's been on Discovery Channel: Venom ER. Knows his stuff from what I've seen.

[rayfound]

I believe this was a Southern Pacific Rattler I saw this week in the SBNF?

[rayfound]

Rapid muscle twitching, as if a person had snakes crawling under the skin, is the telltale sign to Roy Johnson that the Southern Pacific rattlesnake has struck. On occasion, this symptom can progress to difficult breathing, coma and death. This snake's bite is one of the few to induce neurological symptoms, in contrast to most other rattlesnake bites, which initially produce swelling and bruising around the wound, notes Johnson, a physician in Palomar, Calif., who has treated some 700 snakebite cases. Increasingly, the proportion of rattlesnake bites in southern California are skewing to those like the more deadly Southern Pacific species, and scientists are not sure why.

Every year the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention logs 7,000 reports of snakebites in the U.S., which lead to about 15 deaths. Roughly 25 percent of the survivors incur some permanent damage. In southern California, reports from area hospitals and medical centers show a spike in serious bites the facilities say that, where they formerly saw patients with severe neurological symptoms once every two to three years, they now see several of these types of envenomations every year.

Johnson, for one, suspects that humans themselves are to blame for the increase. Most rattlesnakes warn off potential predators by shaking their noisy tails that is what the red rattlesnake and the speckled rattlesnake, southern California's other two dominant coastal species, tend to do. But the noise also makes the reptiles more likely to end up on the killing end of a shovel if the threat is human. In contrast, Southern Pacific rattlesnakes are more apt to lay low or move away than hiss and rattle when confronted, a strategy that may boost their chances of surviving, Johnson says. He speculates that by clubbing its competitors, humans have paved the way for the Southern Pacific to move into new areas. That animal "is adapting to human habitats much like the coyote whether we like it or not," John son remarks.

The rising incidence of supertoxic bite cases could also reflect a change in the species' venom. To predigest their prey, most rattlers produce so-called cytotoxins and hemotoxins, which damage tissue and disrupt blood clotting. But the Southern Pacific also produces a neurotoxin, which is more serious because it quickly affects breathing and muscle control. Anecdotal reports suggest that the snake's venom contains more neurotoxin than it did a few years ago. Richard Dart, director of the Rocky Mountain Poison and Drug Center in Denver, does not rule out that the species could have made its venom more toxic, perhaps by crossbreeding with the more deadly, desert-dwelling Mojave green rattlesnake or by turning on dormant genes developed over time in response to more resistant prey.

The amount of neurotoxin is indeed dramatic compared with the creature's close cousin, the Northern Pacific rattler. This species preys on ground and rock squirrels, which by six weeks of age develop a natural resistance to withstand a full envenomation, suggests research at the University of California, Davis. The Southern variety, however, has enough neurotoxin to overcome any such natural resistance, says biologist William Hayes of Loma Linda University. "Southern Pacifics have no problem getting lots of squirrels."

Still, Hayes does not believe that the rattler's venom has become more toxic. Rather he thinks that people are becoming less tolerant of snake venom, perhaps because of "pollution weakening human lungs and the immune system."

Sean Bush, a treating physician at Loma Linda University Medical Center, says that the Southern Pacific is definitely the "people-biting snake in California" and attributes the increase in incidents to humans encroaching on the animal's coastal and mountain habitat. We are, Bush says, "only now learning how potent and varied rattlesnake venom can be."

Great.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=snake-venom-california

[RubiKinda]

Is it sad that I know this friend to be Grayson just by the description of him having man boobs?

Yup, that would be Grayson... same guy who put a 7.62 x 39mm round through his big toe when demonstrating to his mom how harmless guns were " if you know what you're doing."