[85vette]

There are a lot of Rattlesnakes in Wakulla County. We received quite a few snake calls from citizens when I was a deputy there, but we encountered quite a few on our patrols. There is/was one that I saw near the dump off Lower Bridge Road that, no lie, had to have been 11 feet long. I was in my patrol car headed west and I observed a motorhome about a half mile away, approaching me from the west, move over into the eastbound lane. As it returned to the westbound lane I saw what I assumed to be debris in the eastbound lane behind him. I thought to myself that someone had lost part of their load while enroute to the dump. As I got closer to the "debris" I noticed that the debris was moving! It moved into the tall uncut grass along side the road. I pulled my patrol car onto the grass on that side of the road and.....I felt a bump! And then from the grass a Rattlesnake reared it's head around towards my window, looking at me, head level with my door! Fortunately my window was up. I stared at it for a moment, realizing that it's head was bigger than my fist, it's body was larger around than my leg! And then it turned and slithered into the woods. Apparently I had run over it's tail. It didn't appear to have suffered any injury, at least it didn't hamper it's movement. But that snake was the largest one I have ever seen alive. Later that day I saw a man in a pickup truck stop along Spring Creek Highway with a metal rod capture one that was about 4 feet long. I stopped to talk to him and he looked at me and he grabbed the Rattler by the neck, got in his truck and said, "Dinner", before holding the snake out the window as he drove off! I love Wakulla County!