Well, this is kind of what Ranger B at Usery Mtn Park was trying to convince us of at his weekly brown bag talk. Not many of us were buying that though.
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He passed around a picture of a normal-looking desert wash. "Look closely", he urged. There in the middle of the picture coiled up in the sand in a hoof print was a rattlesnake. Just sunning itself.
"Be aware", says Ranger B. "Look ahead". "Don't put your hands or feet where you haven't looked".
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He says some snakes have an attitude if they've been abused (do they wear a sign?) and may strike without warning. And the little baby snakes don't know how to control their venom and can give a bad bite.
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Mostly, he says, the snakes want to save their venom for something they can eat and not waste it on this big gorilla (human) that is in his space.
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He does admit that most rattlesnake bites are to males between 18 and 25 trying to pick up the snake – macho stuff.
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A snakebite starts liquefying the place where the venom was put, killing the flesh. Very painful. Hospital treatment for snakebites is on average over $100,000. Eek!
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By the time he was done, I was sure I didn't want to leave the pavement...ever! I asked him about how many rattlesnakes I would find on the 1/4 mile nature trail. He estimated that in all of Usery Mtn Park (3 miles square) that there may be about 300. Wow. From his talk, I expected him to say 300 just in the nature trail waiting for us to make a false move!
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We have seen a snake here in previous visits, but if there are only 300 in the park, that must have been unusual.
