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Timber Rattlers?

PirateCaptainLoo

PirateCaptainLoo

Adopt-a-holic <3
Last summer I was at my grandparents, which is in a nice semi-wooded area. They have a large swimming pool, a woodpile, and plenty of land in their backyard. I pulled up in the drive way and nearly ran over a beautiful snake that had a rattler. It scared the dickens out of me! I assumed, from duller colouration, that it was the male. I thought/think that these types of snakes keep their mates instead of being... permiscuous... so I was worried that another full-size (about 6ft, I'd say) would come around soon. My grandparents, unfortunately, killed the beautiful snake by smashing it do death. :puke01: About an hour later I came out to leave and the snake's other came out to find him/her. I didn't know she/he was there until it struck at me. Thankfully I wasn't bitten, but I swear, this is a day I'll NEVER forget! I'm still unsure of what type of snake this was, but considering my area (Southern KY), I assume they were timber rattlesnakes. Their colour really didn't match that of the pictures I've found of timbers, but yeah. They took after-death pictures of them, hopefully I can find them and someone can help me find out what kind of snakes these were!

Thought that would be an interesting story, if not, sorry to waste your time! :p
 
Cool story. Im glad it didn't bite you, that would be bad. That sounds like a perfect place a Timber would live.

Thanks for sharing.
 
I sat on one while hunting once (no I didn't shoot it). It was a baby, maybe 1 foot long. I was playing with it for a while because I didn't know it was a rattlesnake. Now that I saw pics of babies, I know it was.
 
SmokinAFuente said:
I love the Timbers!

You said that the colors were off, could it have been a Canebrake?
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If memory serves me right, I do not think there are "Canebrakes" anymore. I believe they are all timbers. Instead of a differrent subspecies, it is just "regional variation".
 
If memory serves me right, I do not think there are "Canebrakes" anymore. I believe they are all timbers. Instead of a differrent subspecies, it is just "regional variation".
Click to expand...
It depends on who you ask
 
True. I don't believe that the ICZN recognizes Crotalus Horridus Atricaudatus...... Yet. LOL

It does tend to get complicated some times. Even more so when there is a visual difference.
 
A few years back, say around '97 or '98, I was at a buddies house when the Maryland DNR showed up to confiscate all of his Timbers. He had all the permits to have them because he did shows at local schools (he's an ex-principal). Any way, at the time, DNR was not concerned about the Canebrakes. They said that only the Timbers had moved up to, I believe it was, endangered status. I know that things change, but I for one would hate to see them lumped together.

I just check at MD DNR and the Timber is at the State Rank of S3 now.

MD-DNR Ranking Definitions said:
Watch List. Rare to uncommon with the number of occurrences typically in the range of 21 to 100 in Maryland. It may have fewer occurrences but with a large number of individuals in some populations, and it may be susceptible to large-scale disturbances. Species with this rank are not actively tracked by the Natural Heritage Program.
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PirateCaptainLoo - I apologize for the thread-jack.
 
SmokinAFuente said:
I know that things change, but I for one would hate to see them lumped together.
Click to expand...

Agreed. At an educational program on Virginia snakes I took my son to at a nearby nature center last month, the staff member leading the program mentioned that a few years ago developers in Tidewater Virginia (the main part of the state that has canebrakes) tried to dissolve the distinction between canebrakes and timber rattlesnakes because the canebrake's endangered status was preventing them from building in certain areas along the James River.

If the location of the remaining canebrakes in Virginia suggests anything, I suspect that canebrakes don't exist in Maryland anymore. And unlike Maryland, western Virginia probably still has enough undisturbed hardwood/mixed forest to keep the numbers up for the state as a whole.
 
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