So my kid walks in the door from a long day working at the ranch next door, goes into the bathroom and strips down for a shower.
Suddenly a rather high pitched yelp radiates from above the sound of running water.

No bites or stings, but damn....

OMG few year back I worked on a job site in eastern washington. Rattler was killed in the parking lot.

It's just a baby.

The small one have more venom.


Fishy

id say he saw rebeca!!!!

Must be some dangerous country on that ranch next door Sam. Who'd a thunk?

Ah C'mon.....you guys all been watching too many movies.
Not saying I wouldn't be alarmed at finding one in my pants, but as long as I didn't get stung, I'd be OK with it.
I used to catch them regularly overseas. Easy to find at night. They are not aggressive and won't chase you down and kill you and all your kin.
They are pretty darn cool.....creepy, but cool. No need to kill them at all.

isnt it the small ones like that, that can kill you (usually not, depending on body weight, but can), vs the larger Emperor Scorpions that are sold as pets?

speaking of Rattlers, i killed one once....
























with a 12 guage...


seriously..

I'll kill rattlers around the house but give them a pass if I am in their house.
I walked right past a big fat four footer that was asleep in a squirrel hole while deer hunting this year.
He never even woke up as I walked past.
Though I've taken many lives, I don't feel the need to kill just to kill.

First rattler I saw I caught with my hands.....just to do it.
Yeah, then I killed it just to take its rattles. Stupid of me, but I did it. Tarantulas are another cool thing.

I guess most things fall into the class of "Don't bother me....I won't bother you." Spiders go outside if at all possible....sometimes it doesn't happen, but that's the first effort.

Just because I can kill doesn't mean I have to.....There are coyotes yelping outside right now. No, I'm not going to spotlight them and kill them. They no doubt are hunting rats, voles, whatever else they can catch without getting injured.

Now mosquitoes......they don't stand a chance. bastages.

To wander off topic a bit....I have a garter snake story.
Many years ago I was fishing the Wind River (long before it became the nitemare it is today) in July for Steelhead and Late Springers. I was fishing the lower end of a riffle when I looked upstream and saw a garter snake swimming downriver with the current. I thought it must have fallen in. As I watched it, it kept swimming towards me. I was wearing hip boots and was in about knee-deep water. It swam within two feet of me and as it got just past me it dove under the water. I thought it had sunk and was considering grabbing it and taking it to shore. It was crawling between the baseball-sized cobble on the bottom when I saw a puff of sand come out of the downriver side of one of the cobbles. The snake backed out and came to the surface right in front of me with a sculpin in its mouth. The fish was trying to shake free, but that snake had him for good. It then swam to the shore and up on the beach somewhere to eat his lunch. I didn't follow, but that was the coolest thing to see happen right at my feet.

I ran into rattlers often when I worked for the Game Department in Central Washington. I was a bit surprised how different they are dpending on where they live. The rattlers south of Moses Lake near the Potholes are usually barely 2 ft long, are generally light brown and the bios said they have an extra piece of gut to digest what they eat. I saw one up in the Sinlahekin that was close to 4 ft long and was greenish in color. I saw a mounted skin that measured 49 inches without the head.
I heard more than I saw. Never killed one.

If reincarnation is for real, you might come back as the form of life you abused the most. I'm gonna hate being a slug!

"form of life you abused the most"

Guess I know what I'll come back as since I abuse the bald champ.

OH Chuckie!!

Watched a garter snake hunt in our backyard pond. It was on the bottom, nosing around, and flicking its tongue apparently trying to "scent" a fish. Rather neat to watch.

In Australia, my wife found a spider in the house. Being afraid of any and all spiders she asked me to dispose of it. Caught it in a glass, went to the deck, and tossed it towards the ground. The Brush Turkey, a very common bird around there, played Willie Mays and gobbled the spider up before it hit the ground.

have only seen two rattlesnakes in the wild, almost stepping on a baby which was the prettiest snake i have ever seen. Didn't see a need to kill either.

I'm out.............Good luck,
SZ