Sorry to hear that your neighbors have eradicated the harmless snake population ...I can understand killing a poisonous snake in an area where it is likely to come in contact w/humans or pets ...although, personally, I would choose to relocate it to a remote area if possible. Unfortunately most people can't tell one snake from another; so, naturally, they kill them all our of fear.
I try to let my neighbors know I will gladly be the “go to guy” to remove any snakes from their premises ...usually it's too late, though, by the time I find out someone has already killed another “copperhead” ...last one turned out to be a beautiful young eastern kingsnake; how they thought that was a “copperhead” I will never know ...same/same w/northern brown snakes/ring-necked snakes/mole kingsnakes ...all “copperheads” to the locals.
We have quite a few eastern hog-nosed snakes in the area ...I've caught several in the yard ...last one was a neat melanistic specimen which I relocated to a wooded area on Ft Lee (local Army Post) where I figured he'd have a decent chance for survival. We also have eastern rat snakes, northern water snakes, brown water snakes, garter snakes and rough green snakes ...also saw what was left of a rough earth snake my younger brother killed in his yard down in Chesapeake ...had never seen that species in the wild before (or since). Technically, there are cottonmouths in the local part of the Appomattox River and Copperheads are found throughout most of VA ...I've never seen either in the local neighborhood or the local park that borders the Appomattox. I have seen both species when out in the woods or fishing; but, most of those were down in the feeder creeks on the west bank of the tidal portion of the James River ...cottonmouths are quite common on some of those brackish feeder creeks ...have seen groups of them sunning on logs together down there.
Sounds like a very large rat snake that you had in the yard ...probably consumed a lot of rodents to get that big. Too bad about her ultimate fate ...life's tough if you're a snake.
Be careful w/those “hot” herps ...I leave them to the pro’s; and even they usually get “nailed” eventually. I'm sure you have probably seen photo's of necrotic hands/feet after a bite from a pit viper. I value my extremities waaaay too much to want to expose them to that possibility ...and of course people do die from snakebite or anaphylactic shock from a reaction to the antivenin.
Good luck w/your herping ...and stay safe!
I’m sure I’m already shunned/excommunicated by some folks for lesser reasons so what’s one more?...LOL
Lucky you to live is such a wonderfully diverse and rich snake environment.
A couple years ago I had to “escort” a water snake down the lane as it slithered in the rain runoff to to junction of two streams near me.
If I hadn’t kept ‘shooing’ it along, eventually somebody else would have seen it and screamed “Cottonmouth!” even though we don’t even *have* them here.
I’ve been sheltering a group of young Northern Water Snakes up in the catfish pond from my dad.
They hang out under the roots of an old pine tree and I’ve dragged brush and whatnot to that area to make it hard for my dad to go around that spot and discover them.
I know how things are there.
Everything brown here is a “Rattlesnake” and everything else that’s tan/red/rust/whatever is a “Copperhead”.
[our Ring Necks are purplish-olive above so I’m not sure how they get mistaken for “killers”...but ya never know...they could be seriously misplaced mutant Kraits].../s
The big rat snake was here when I was a teenager.
My great-uncle lived in the house near mine and I used to visit him and my great aunt during the summer.
We always lifted up the old empty oil drum in the wood shed to see if Snake was under there and it always was, waiting for wood rats or mice to wander by.
[this was back in the 70s, mind you!]
I guess it’s cold comfort that Snake had a really good long run, considering that I first saw him/her over 35 years ago.
That one Copper hatchling was my first and last personal hot experience.
I know my limits.
I observed it for a week and took it into the woods.
[it would’ve gotten lawn-mowed for sure had dad seen it]
I’ve only seen Cottons in Coles Point, VA.
[the Potomac turns brackish, there]
There’s a long pontoon bridge over the bog in the campground of the marina and they were always out sunning themselves or swimming past me as the bridge span sank under the water when I rode my bike across.
One year there was a commotion of the shore of the bog and some guy was beating to death a whole clutch of newly hatched ones.
Never saw the sense in that.
Nobody in their right mind would ever enter their murky, leech-infested world and they never left it.
The neighbor came to the door one day, all grins and pride, to tell me he’d weed-wacked all the garters who draped themselves over the lower branches of the old willow.
I guess I was supposed to be thrilled....:(
I laugh at the thought of of my dad or neighbor coming in and walking through the foyer [or ‘dog trot’ as we call it] and finding themselves “running the gauntlet” past all the snake enclosures.
Worse yet if they open my freezer and wonder what’s in all those weird plastic bags.
[I always was a “problem child”]
;D