Over The River and Down The Road to Arizona I Go

[dirtclod Az.]

Glad to have you!

 

[Maxhunter]

Congrats and thanks for sharing your adventure.

 

[mallardsx2]

Might be a dumb ? but I got to ask...

Why do you have a 6 foot long pole stretched across your 4 wheeler handlebars? Those your shooting sticks?

 

[JimP]

It's my walking stick along with helping steady my pistol. It is a stem off of a yucca plant. It has kept me from hitting the ground a number of times and when we hike into the canyon that has the rattlesnake den in I can use it to move the snakes around a little to get a better picture.

I used to cut one every year that I went down. I have quite a collection of them. This year I took the one that I had back in 2001, I have the date cut into it.

 

[dirtclod Az.]

MMMM...Lunch!

 

[JimP]

That snake den is quite interesting. Some years when we hike into it we find nothing, the snakes are way deep into it. Then other years they are out all over the place to the point that you really need to be careful on where you step. The year that I found it there was a beautiful diamondback just starting into the den. I was concentrating on him so much I didn't see the two guard snakes right at the entrance. I thought that I could reach down and grab his tail and pull him out but had second thoughts about it. I got in touch with our friend from down that way and had him come up to the site to see it. I then took stock of where I was standing and saw several other snakes in the general vicinity but none right where I was standing or even close to it.

Our friend took a serpentologist from the U of A into it to show him. The serpentologist tried to find it again but never did. He wanted to insert some tracking devises on a couple of snakes.

 

[dirtclod Az.]

Very cool, I live in a desert region and rarely see Rattlesnakes.
When I do they are near water.
We actually harvested 4 in one day with our bows at Lake Pleasant Az.
Pic of a small one caught bare-handed
with my 2 uncles!

 

[lukew]

Good luck!