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Crotalus oreganus oreganus
This was one very hungry rattle snake!! It was half inside and half outside a hole on the mountain. Must be eating or waitng in ambush!!
foothills.
the other day i saw a beetle scuttling across. A lizard ran out of the bush with amazing speed!! I bet these could speed too.
I've watched documentaries on it before, it's incredible. You should see if you can find some YouTube videos on it, it really blows your mind! Especially when they do it in slow motion but still time it!
If you look at the snake in the second picture,it does look ready to strike if needed.
Ashley , I really appreciate your expert advice!
That is what the general population does not know that " snakes can strike incredibly fast"
Well it's never a good idea to stand close to a venomous snake (or harmless if you don't want to get bit), but being a decent distance away is okay. Just be aware of what it's doing, snakes can strike incredibly fast.
As a general rule, snakes can strike about half their body length. But that only works if you can see the whole body and estimate how long it is haha. Smaller, slender snakes can kind of launch their body at you if you make them really grumpy, but a large rattlesnake like this wouldn't be able to get its whole body off the ground to do that
Ashley,this question has been bugging me for a while. Some people were standing in front of it,about 5 ft away and looking at it. It seemed safe! But what if it had lunged forward to strike?!!
There is no way to tell age of a snake by looking at it. The number of rattles indicate how many times it has shed in its life, and generally the longer the rattle gets, the easier it is to break off. This is probably an old ish individual, but there is no way to tell.
I went back after two hours to see it. Looks like it had it's meal. it was sitting there all coiled up. it did make eye contact with me.