22 shotshells

mudskipper said:

You guys are way, WAY too afraid of snakes.... Step aside, let 'em go by, and they'll be gone in a few minutes. They know they can't eat you, so the only options they have are fight or flight. Given the choice, they'll always take "flight", unless you don't let them.

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+1

You leave them alone, they'll leave you alone.

I've never understood people that shoot snakes- they eat rodents; that's a good thing. It's like people who shoot bats because they're "scary"... unfortunately, they also eat their body weight in mosquitoes every night. That means dead bat = more mosquitoes.

Norton said:

I blast a rattler this weekend with them and he ate them up like they were candy. After about 6 shotshells, I finally put a couple of hollowpoint .22s in his midsection and that did the job.

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Maybe you missed.

Adams74Chevy said:

You must be related to my brother in law. He is terrified by any snakes, a few years ago he was getting the yead ready to have my nephew's birthday party and he blasted a black snake 3 times with his 12 gauge, needless to say not much left of the snake or the grass in the area.

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Nah, I like snakes meself (check the name ), but if .22 shotshells don't do the trick, I figure ya might as well just go with what you know works. I'm also a firm believer in mounting a bayonet on a crew-served weapon, just in case you run out of ammo.

Norton, next time consider if your ammo will take out the biggest Rattlesnake you know.

BlackBart said:

Maybe you missed.

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Not that I'm some sort of gun fighter or anything, but I was hitting him and he was metaphorically giving me the finger and saying, "Is that all you got?"

Rattlesnake46319 said:

Norton, next time consider if your ammo will take out the biggest Rattlesnake you know.

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Are you volunteering?



This sounds like the start of a 9mm vs 45acp thread.

Norton said:

Not that I'm some sort of gun fighter or anything, but I was hitting him and he was metaphorically giving me the finger and saying, "Is that all you got?"

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That was probably his tongue.

Benlineberry said:

+1

You leave them alone, they'll leave you alone.

I've never understood people that shoot snakes- they eat rodents; that's a good thing. It's like people who shoot bats because they're "scary"... unfortunately, they also eat their body weight in mosquitoes every night. That means dead bat = more mosquitoes.

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I'm suddenly curious about how big the snakes we have in MD actually get. All I've ever seen are garter snakes that were just wide enough to eat a cricket. From reading, I know that copperheads get big enough to chow down on rodents, but I've never seen one since they seem to shy away from suburbs.

Simon Yu said:

I'm suddenly curious about how big the snakes we have in MD actually get. All I've ever seen are garter snakes that were just wide enough to eat a cricket. From reading, I know that copperheads get big enough to chow down on rodents, but I've never seen one since they seem to shy away from suburbs.

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Im not a snake expert, so I don't know what it was......but recently I saw a 4 to 5' long snake at a friend's house chomping down on something. We assumed it to be a mouse.

The snake was brownish with some type of textured design on it.

Norton said:

Are you volunteering?



This sounds like the start of a 9mm vs 45acp thread.

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Feed me enough beer and I might! God knows I've done dumber things while drunk.

edit: I'm only volunteering for the .22 shotshells.

Rattlesnake46319 said:

Feed me enough beer and I might! God knows I've done dumber things while drunk.

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Branding people is fun. That is all.

Simon Yu said:

I'm suddenly curious about how big the snakes we have in MD actually get. All I've ever seen are garter snakes that were just wide enough to eat a cricket. From reading, I know that copperheads get big enough to chow down on rodents, but I've never seen one since they seem to shy away from suburbs.

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I've seen several 5'-6' black snakes up here in the sticks of Northern Frederick County and a rattler that was probably in the 2'-3' range in the Frederick watershed.

Simon Yu said:

I'm suddenly curious about how big the snakes we have in MD actually get. All I've ever seen are garter snakes that were just wide enough to eat a cricket. From reading, I know that copperheads get big enough to chow down on rodents, but I've never seen one since they seem to shy away from suburbs.

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The black snake is probably the biggest/longest native snake we have in the MD/NoVA area. I saw a 6 footer over 4th of July weekend up at a campground near Harper's Ferry. We relocated her a mile down the road up in the woods before someone at the campground with an irrational fear of snakes could kill her. She was a big, healthy girl, almost as thick as my wrist and as black and shiny as a piece of volcanic glass. Had a temper too. Chewed on my left forearm real good until she got settled down!!!


As far as poisonus snakes around here, we only have two - the northern copperhead and the timber rattler. A "big" copperhead will be 3 feet long - most are less than 2 feet. Copperheads are more common than you'd think, but they're very reclusive, and their coloration makes them almost invisible. You could be walking along in the woods and walk right by one 6 inches away laying in the leaves and never even glimpse it. And that's exactly what the snake wants - to be really still, blend in, and not be seen by you as you walk by and go on your way. The snake knows if you can see it, you might kill and eat it, so the snake knows it's in its own best interest not to be seen. I've only found a copperhead ONE time by going out and looking for one - but I've seen maybe a dozen by random chance, mostly when they were in a spot where the coloration made them stand out. (FAIL!)

With the timber rattler, 3 feet is average/big, and a truely huge one will be over 4 feet. It's possible you might - MIGHT - find the much larger and rarer canebreak rattler on the eastern shore or extreme southern MD, but pretty unlikley. They can be up to 6 feet long and very fat.

We DO NOT have water moccassins/cotton mouths in this area, despite what anyone tells you. It gets way too cold here, for way too long, for any to survive the winters. You only find them south of tidewater VA and further south. A lot of people will see a snake swimming and automatically assume it's a moccassin, but they're wrong. It's nearly always a northern water snake. They can be big - 3 or 4 feet - and are brown with an darker brown hourglass pattern on their back. They look somewhat like a copperhead, but are more subdued and faded in their coloration. Any creek or marsh will have a northern watersnake in it. They and garter snakes are probably the most common snakes around here.




For really "exciting" poisonus snakes, you have to go to central or south America, Africa, India, SE Asia or Australia.

The scariest venomous snake I've ever seen was a Fer-DeLance. That's a neotropical viper. Hemotoxic AND nuerotoxic vemon, and plently of it since they're a HUGE snake. If it wanted to, it could kill you and 30 or 40 of your closest friends before it ran dry. I saw it while fishing in a creek in Belize. The guide I was fishing with pointed it out. He didn't seem too freaked out, so I figured it was alright. I was more worried about the crocidiles that kept popping up as we were wading in this creek (yeah, wading...). Anyway, it swam right by - all 12 FEET OF IT- about an arms' length away. Never paid us any attention at all. Just went right by.



Snakes are cool like that.....

If you need to shoot a copperhead, make sure it is a copperhead and not a milk snake. They look similar at first glance.

F snakes. I'm like Indiana Jones...not much scares me, but snakes do.

Boondock Saint said:

Branding people is fun. That is all.

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F that. I saw Jackass 2.

Rattlesnake46319 said:

F that. I saw Jackass 2.

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I haven't seen it, but I do know which end of the implement to be on when the shit goes down. Thankfully, I did not need to find out the hard way, but my buddy most certainly did.

The only time I had any luck getting rid of a huge snake using shot shells was when I had them in my .44 Magnum. I do have a box of shot shells for my .22, but I'd only use that to try and dissuade someone after they came into my house un-invited. The shot shell is only loaded in the first chamber, after that it's real bullets.

But to answer a question about snake shot being used in a simi auto handgun? No (not in my case anyway), they aren't designed to be used that way. If you get them to work in your gun, consider yourself lucky. Most of the time they get jammed up rendering the gun useless until you clear it out.

But I do have an interesting story involving a snake and the shot shells. I had forgotten about all of this because it happened so long ago (about 1979-1980).

My neighbor had a snake over 6' long wrapped in his wifes bush (the flower garden type of bush, not the kind of bush some of you may be thinking of) He had his AR out to blast this thing when I saw him. Naturally I had to ask him what in the world he was gonna do with an AR? I didn't want him going nuts with this thing because I lived about 150 yards from him, and I had two small children at home. I got out of my van to investigate the situation.

When I saw what he was talking about I tried to get the snake out without doing damage to either the bush or the snake. Each time I got near this thing he would try and bite me, so I gave up on that idea. The way he was wrapped around the bush was so that his hear and tail end were right by each other.

I went to my home and got my .44 Magnum Ruger Blackhawk and loaded it with the Shot Shells. The next time he opened his mouth, he got some BB Mouth-wash. Needless to say his head was like that of hamburger. It only took one shot to accomplish this. The funny thing was even though the complete head was gone, the snake kept moving like it was still alive. The totally freaked my neighbor out. He kept asking me how he was going to get the snake out of the bush before it started stinking? Jokingly I told him to get someone else to remove it. That would be the easiest way I could think of to get rid of it.

After a very brief second my neighbor tells me to unwrap the snake from the bush because he was afraid of snakes. I looked at him and said, are you afraid the snake will BITE YOU? He no longer has a head, how's he going to BITE YOU? Then I told him I had already helped him out, and he needed to finish the job (I think his two step-sons cut it into pieces to get it completely out of the bush) At least when all was said and done, the wife didn't kill us all because no damage was done to her beloved bush.

The 9mm shotshells cycle 100% in my Ruger P-89. It was an expensive experiment, but neat to see it actually work.

mudskipper said:

Snakes are cool like that.....

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no they're not. Anything that moves on land without legs isn't cool in my book.

mudskipper said:

You guys are way, WAY too afraid of snakes.... Step aside, let 'em go by, and they'll be gone in a few minutes. They know they can't eat you, so the only options they have are fight or flight. Given the choice, they'll always take "flight", unless you don't let them.

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I recently spent a week guiding some kids through the shenandoahs, and after waiting patiently for them to produce the bear bags they were given earlier in the day, I searched each one of their bags only to find nothing.

Already dark, it started to downpour as I stood outside their tarp. I changed the order, and tried to wait patiently as they put their food in trash bags, which I then would have to sleep with under my hammock. Although relatively safe with the bears we have here, I never like sleeping with food.

Infuriated and completely soaked I hiked back, in the dark, to the area we ate in to grab my pack which I knew would now be soaked as well, including my hammock and sleeping bag. Concluding the short hike with my pack in sight I reached down and grabbed my pack by the shoulder strap just as I saw a good sized copperhead at my feet. I recoiled and thought about how with my foot an inch away from him he could have easily tagged me.

Now at a safe distance away, I sat and watched as he glared at me before making a slow retreat. Thinking about his coloration and my close encounter it took me a good 30 minutes to hike 50 feet through the dried dead leaves littering the ground on the way to my tarp.

I hate snakes, but agree, leave them alone they will leave you alone.

(edit. PS. I later remembered that after getting frustrated with the kids for refusing to volunteer to carry their own gear, and running on a time limit, that I had placed bear bags in my own pack)