Mowing the Grass

Its time to mow the grass in California again. This time Huimin has called on Victoria to come up and help her; and, to bring her mower too, in case there are snakes out there. I wish I could sit with the kids in the house and watch as those two try to scare all the snakes out of the grass and get it mowed. The scary part is walking past the unmowed section as you push the mower forward. A snake can have quite a long striking distance.

When we first moved into our house in Sun Prairie Estates we had the challenge of mowing weeds, in the first pasture, that were higher than our kids. It was horrible. I got a scythe and then me and the kids knocked down the weeds and piled them into the back of the open scout. We looked like a huge haystack going down the road to the dump. It took many trips.

However around the shed, it wasn't only weeds, it was weeds, very tall grass and spilled over oats from the neighbor's field. Tim was mowing with the rider all the grass areas (around the shed, the lower pasture and the upper field). As he was mowing around the shed something bit him as he was mowing through the grass. He was sitting on the riding tractor with tall leather boots on. A snake had zero'd in on him and bit right through the boot. Luckily we had bull snakes out there, so it was not poisonous.

Here is another site on rattlesnakes: http://www.whmentors.org/saf/snakes.html

It includes their striking distance, first aid for bites and symptoms of the poison. Rattlers are pit vipers. These snakes have pits between their eyes and nostrils which detect heat. They use these "pits" to hunt for warm blooded prey. So, hopefully, if they are in front of the lawnmower, they will confuse the heat of the mower with the body heat of the girls. They can strike from 1/2 to 1/3 their length. Oh yea, another thing..they hunt day and night. One more note of caution--their tails don't rattle if they are wet.

According to this site, Huimin and Victoria will be able to discern whether the snakes are rattlers or gopher snakes by looking at their teeth. If it ONLY has two fangs on top -- it is a rattler. If it has a full set of teeth on top -- it is a gopher snake pretending to be a rattler. So, Huimin and Victoria...be careful!