Cottonmouth out in the forest
 

Connie and I had to take a drive out into the Apalachicola National Forest earlier today and on the way spotted this cottonmouth sunning himself right on the sandy road. Well, I had my newfangled Samsung Galaxy S8+ smart phone with me, so heck, why not use that to take some pics and video of it?

Didn't turn out too bad for 4K, I guess, but the shadows seem to be excessively dark to me. Might be some settings in the phone to correct that, but it's not something I have had much reason to look into yet.

Anyway, I guess it IS nice to be able to take 4K video at the drop of a hat just using your phone.



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cvRZXRbFJP4

YOU, my friend, are one seriously screwed up photographer.
Had I seen that, my first thought would have been to hit it
with the car 5 or 6 times, and NOT to stop for pictures. Yeah,
Yeah, Yeah, I know you've been around snakes almost all of your
life and know how to deal with them, but DAYUM doesn't it
hurt like a bitch if they strike and get you? By the way, nice video,
and by the looks of it, a very nice specimen as well. Very Pretty
Cottonmouth. Any way to gauge the age/sex of it? Do I like watching
videos of snakes like this? YEP! Do I have any desire to meet
one up up close and personal? NOPE! Keep the videos coming, Rich!
Andy :wavey:
I really like the way it kept it's eyes on the phone/your hand.

Oh, I was in no danger of being bitten. I know how they strike, and a snake cannot actually fly through the air. The time to be worried is when they coil up, because then judging how far they can strike becomes more difficult to do.

This one would have gotten NO purchase from the sand and would have been limited to only the length of that first bend in his neck behind the head. Maybe four inches, at best.

I am not familiar enough with cottonmouths and their growth rate to be able to hazard a guess about it's age. And as for sex, you can sometimes tell by the taper of the tail from the body, but that would be only a rough guess. I really didn't pay attention while taking the video. And unless you are planning on catching it and use it in a breeding program, it probably really doesn't matter much.

And as for running it over, nah. It was in it's home turf out in the national forest, and not likely to cause anyone any grief unless that person stepped on it or tried to get too familiar with it. As long as some critter isn't causing me any grief, I don't have any issues with them. But things like squirrels destroying my bamboo, possums eating my tangerines, or armadillos digging around making tunnels underneath the house and buildings, well even them, I prefer trapping them and releasing them somewhere else rather than killing them. The one exception I made to that rule was when I caught a big raccoon, and unlike all the rest of them I have caught, this SOB made it clear that if it could get out of that trap, it was going to try to KILL me. Sad to say, but I just could not give it that opportunity and had to dispatch it. Even knowing it's apparent thoughts, I still greatly regretted having to kill it. Raccoons are just so damned cute. Usually when I trap them they just look up at you with those big wide eyes like they are saying "Why ME?"

I almost stepped on one while tree rat hunting. My foot was about 1ft away and that snake was not gonna move. Glad i looked down.