Rattler on trail above Elkmont

[Stonefly]

I've only had one snake be aggressive towad me and that was a cottonmouth. Jeff

Same here. My cousin and I spent a lot of time in the oxbow lakes off the Mississippi. He made the mistake once of casting at a moc, which came after the boat, dang near as fast as I could skull it in the other direction.

sb

[snaildarter]

Interesting stats found today from The Economist:

Link

Seems that the average American is 3,100 times more likely to die of falling, 67 times more likely to die of drowning in a bathtub, and 7 times more likely to die of lightning than to die of being snake bit. The average American is more likely to die of having their PJ's catch on fire than by snake bite (maybe from smoking in bed?). Of course, fisherman are not quite "average" Americans.

Of thousands of snakes I've seen while hiking and fishing (yes thousands, I see snakes practically every time I go out, and don't know why others don't see them), the only poisonous snake that was ever aggressive toward me was a copperhead on the Honey Creek Loop in Big South Fork. Walking along, big rock next to the trail, and AAAHHH! This snake strikes at me from under a fern next to the rock. It then sidewindered forward another foot or two and struck at me again, although I had already jumped back about 5 feet. It staying in the trail looking p'd for about 2 more seconds, then went under the rock as fast as it could.

[MickinMS]

I saw something cool/creepy yesterday. I drove over to the Spring River in Northern Arkansas. I was fishing this very weedy section and catching quite a few fish off of a peacock sow bug when I started hearing some splashing. I look over about 25 yards away and some type of snake had caught a 12 inch rainbow and was dragging it to a log in the river. I never new they caught live, healthy fish but this fish was fighting like mad to get away. I tried to get over to get a pic with my camera phone, but I chickened out before I could get close enough to get a good shot.

It creeped me out and had me paranoid for the rest of the afternoon!

[flyyak]

I saw a 3 foot rattler on Lynn Camp friday. The snake was laying between the trail and the stream about 50 yards past the bench at the cascades overlook. Like most rattlers he was peacefull and just wanted to be left alone.

[Tennessee Jed]

I took this picture of a copperhead in October 2006 on the Abrams Creek trail. He was just off to the side.

[bugg]

nice jed. i have seen plenty of rattlers this year but not a single copperhead but not really sure why.

[knucklehead]

I was up at tremont on Tuesday and 5 feet from the stream, I found this guy just hanging out. rather cool outside. cloudy. would not have expected to see it. but what a beautiful creature. it was about 3-3.5 feet long and rather slim for a timber rattler. great coloration though. very bright yellow patterns. watched him for several minutes, never rattled and never even looked aggressive until the park ranger beside me started to poke him with a short baton I thought he was an idiot, but... I had a 4 foot walking stick with me and tried to get it to strike the stick but it would only hiss. so i decided to let it be. and it went back to appearing to be asleep. very impressive creature. very docile. ALWAYS, ALWAYS, ALWAYS WATCH WHERE YOU PUT YOUR HANDS!!! It was right where someone could have easily reached to get a grip and climb.

[caught 108]

Nice Picture's everybody,I've seen some over the year's.But I try my best to avoid them.

[bugg]

thats a nice picture knucklehead. he's colored up nicely.