Posted on 12/19/2014 5:41:58 AM PST by Scoutmaster
Rattlesnakes don't release themselves.
My first time in the Okefenokee, we were camping on Mixon's Hammock. When we got there, the landing 'beach' was covered with sunning 'gators 2'-4' long. Maybe one or two close to 5'.
So we pulled our canoes up broadside and poked 'em gently with paddles until they decided to leave. They didn't leave when we simply splashed 'em. Probably wasn't the right thing to do now, but it was at the time.
I have at least three other 'at the time' Okefenokee stories, one of which involves a chubby Scout, an overturned rental canoe with a bad flotation well, and a Free Willie moment.
I'd love to hear your other solo wood-cutting stories. You owe me a winter campfire, some cowboy coffee, and a lot of stories punctuated by Robert W. Service. The longest I've ever gone without the shower is eleven days, while my son has me beat with, I think, 25 days.
It was embers under the snow to start the morning fire for my instant coffee and pinto beans, with bacon for the first few days after my town visit, then just coffee and beans after that, my chain saw during the day, and then chain sharpening after my beans and coffee supper, and then sitting in my sleeping bag reading War and Peace and other good books with propane lantern at night.
A trapper came by once, and another time a tiny group of hippies spent a week in the area camping, they appeared to be permanent travelers.
I might have seen that movie or something... lol
You had propane?
Wussy.
For the lantern yes, you had something to eat besides pinto beans, and perhaps you had a camp stove?
I'd have cast Tommy Lee Jones as Officer Clem Luttrell, but knowing the Coen brothers, they've have stuck with William H. Macy.
I'm not certain the area around the Licking River would necessarily have worked for the scenery; I threw in 'pining for the Licking' instead of pining for the fjords and I'm more familiar with Paris, Kentucky than the Licking River.
Clem and Skeeter aren't true Bourbon County names. Bourbon County is more horses and, well, bourbon.
You had beans?
You said "'pinto' beans."
Now, when we had beans - and I said when, because we usually had a piece of bark. I don't particularly like bark. And I had to share my piece of bark with my drooling cousin Curtis.
But when we had beans, we didn't have any fancy-schmancy specific varieties of beans, like pinto beans or black bean or cannellini beans. We weren't choosy about our legumes.
We just had beans. From the plain white generic bags, that were usually misprinted "baens."
Except they didn't come from bags and we had to pick 'em, and we walked five miles, uphill, in the snow, both ways, to pick 'em. And we were glad to have 'em because bark gets stuck between your teeth.
lol
And my family didn't cotton to those new-fangled things called shoes. And they hadn't since my family line crawled out of caves and began to walk upright.
During the Eisenhower administration.
Being noisy doesn’t help. Let’s use wolves as an example. A healthy pack of wolves seldom goes after livestock. So killing a wolf that is secure in a healthy pack weakens the group and makes it MORE likely that they will scavenge at a ranch.
Cougars don’t “officially” exist in Ohio, either - except for all the sightings that are written off as “escaped pets”.
One ran across the road in front of me in Indian Hill - in Cincinnati - in the late 1980’s.
Some friends in Blanchester, Ohio (30 miles from Cincinnati) regularly have a male and female mountain lion visit their rural property. The cops told them they were mistaken - until there were more reports. Then the cops told my friends to shoot it the next time they saw it, which they refused to do. The pair still shows up every couple of years.
A few years ago in Amelia, Ohio (outside of Cincinnati) some homeowners on a golf course saw a few deer racing frantically across the golf course - followed by a mountain lion. Wildlife officials found prints, but of course, wrote it off as yet another escaped “pet”.
Never could figure out why wildlife officials always think they are escaped pets. There is obviously a breeding population in southern Ohio.
Earlier this year there was a black bear wandering all over Cincinnati. Officials immediately said it was bear from Kentucky that swam across the Ohio. Some wondered if there were more than one bear as it was showing up in different places. The news followed it avidly - then suddenly stopped, despite more sightings, and never mentioned it again. It was kind of suspicious that all newspapers and local news stopped the same day.
One day while they were eating lunch him and the other miners were speculating on what this bunch was doing as they had been there a couple of days and he decided well I will just go ask them and did so. According to what they told him they were releasing copperheads and rattlesnakes into the wild as they wanted to increase the population. He was like WTH!
Reminds me of a conservation I had with a Game Warden. I live in East Tennessee a few miles from Norris Lake. I live in a rural area and I own some of the more dense land nearby with thickets. He was looking for a place to release deer and I obliged him.
Our conversation turned to snakes and I said yeah I've killed several Copperheads right outside my house in the past few years. He looked seriously at me and said They're protected you know. I said not near my house they aren't. He grinned and said mine either.
I've lived in my neighborhood over 50 years. Deer weren't seen until about the last decade. A couple ridges over closer to the lake there were deer but not in our area. Now I have to watch for them when I go down my driveway. The main things I shoot on sight if seen in my yard is Copperheads, Coons, & Yotes.
Black Bears can be an occasional problem in this area. One bear gets a wild hair and decides to go from the Appalachians to the Cumberlands and they have to cross at least one interstate and a 70 plus mile walk to get there. Last year one was hit on the interstate inside Knoxville city limits.
Mountain Lions? Yeah I think it's likely some have been in the Kentucky, Virginia, North Carolina, & Tennessee mountains all along. I don't think they ever completely disappeared and I think sightings are played down by GW's.
Mountain Lion was one theory some persons had about a small kid 7 years old I think disappearing on a hiking trail 45 years ago in the Smokies. http://www.wbir.com/longform/news/local/2014/05/22/dennis-martin-missing-45-years/9405607/ Although a cat attack was possible as was black bear I think the kid panicked and ran into very dense foliage and steep terrain. That was compounded by a bad storm the night he was lost, rain the next day and night as well. I was about 12 at the time and was going on a back country three day fishing trip into an area called Eagle Creek. My dad, a family friend, & I were on the trail from the Cades Cove picnic area that went to the place the next day unaware the boy was missing. The creeks and branches were roaring from the heavy rains. No sign of him except I think maybe a shoe was ever found. Anythings possible but in that area terrain, heavy foliage, and panic, is a deadly combination.
BTW Sarge I’d almost bet the snakes GW was confiscated from a church or two in that area. A bit easier and likely safer to say that than he took them from a church. They raid a church or two in my county every now and then LOL.
that’s chevelle, not cougar
This one seems to be living in the Orlean area... with cubs...So not traveling. The high Knob one may well be another cat..
“Their Range is impressive”..... Or it was caught and released...
I remember a Brit bloke was catching crocs and releasing them in suburbia canals and rivers in India, upsetting the locals... The bloke thought they should be there, as they used to be. The locals kept losing kids who went to the water for bathing......
If I walk up on a bear near my house and the bear doesn’t fear me and run, the bear is a goner. If I see a big cat near my house.... gone... All these tough people who think the cat should be left alone in an area populated by humans will suddenly vanish from the debate when a child is killed.
Yeap. Wild animals that looses fear of man should be taken out. About an hour ago my wife said someone is slamming a car door outside. Our Ratty was barking also. I grabbed my pistol and went out for a look see. I heard some fireworks about a third a mile away then I heard a Yote cut loose too darn close for comfort near me but close to my neighbors barn. I called him and he stepped out and heard it. The fireworks set off the Yote. Next time I take the dogs out I'm taking a bigger pistol and a headlamp.
I kill coons on sight also when near the house. I had four of them stand their ground with me a growling and I don't play that game. A coon can tear you up good & several of them wanting food more so.
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