The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1895-09-29
SNAKE BARS IN TEXAS.
How Residents Protect Their Homes
From Invasion By Reptiles.

J. D. Mason, well-known travelling
man, who has just returned from a bust
ness trip through southwest Texas, gives
the following Interesting account of a
peculiar phase OF life in that part of the
world:
There is a little strip of country"
Sald Mason, IN Texas are literally too
Grande where snakes are literally too
numerous to mention. They are really as
thick as the proverbial dead leaves of
Vallombrosa, and the most abstemious
a minute to knock him silly l have a
friend, Jim Hughes by name, living in
that region, who owns a cattle ranch.
consisting, OF 1880 acres of land, and
really and truly the trail of the serpent
was over them all. Jim has a wife who
is the prettiest little woman west of the
mississippi and two of the dearest little
girls in the whole world, I reckon, and
Tor long time Jim was put to it to
know how to protect his family from
snakes. He said that it used to be 50
that during the first warm days of
spring, when the snakes were awaken
ing from their torpor, he and his ranch
men. cowboys etc, would just have to
leave the cattle to their fate and form
gordon about the, house to keep the
reptiles out Nowadays, though, such
constant precaution is not necessary, as
he has hit upon a device to circumVent
the snakes to certain extent. He man
ages to do this by fencing in the house
yard with closely woven wire netting.
ITO begin with. however. he had to
dig a ditch all around the place to a
depth of about four feet, and plant
six feet above the level of the ground.
Then on these posts he stretched ten
foot wire netting and threw the dirt
back into the ditch. By this means you
see, he had four feet of netting under
ground, which prevented the snakes bur-
rowing beneath and coming into the
yard, and a SfX-foot fence above. which
only the more adventuresome reptiles
try to surmount. Now and then a little
snake will manage to wriggle through
the meShes of the wire and get into the
yard. but the big fellows are practically
man goes all over the yard on a tour Of
inspection, killing all the small snakes
that may have crept in before Mrs.
Hughes or the little girls venture out
of the house. 1t is not a very pleasant
prospect either. although you are seated
in the house in comparative security. to
look over the fence and see the reptiles
writhing and squirntng in the sun, now
and then putting against the fence. or
clinging to the wire in hideous coiling
feStoonS.
"About two miles away from the place
stream makes into the river, and here
the reptiles breed. Hughes inve!gled me
into going over one night to the neigh
borhood of the bog, and [ shall never
forget the horrible noises that eman-
ated therefrom. The snakes were evil
IDENTIFY lighting among themselves. and
the bog seemed to be alive with them
Deliver me from another experience Ike
the one that night, and from a nome in
Texas down by the Rio Grande. Hughes
thinks it is the garden spot of the uni
verse, however, and says when he sue
ceeds in getting that marsh properly
drained the snakes will disappear. -
From the Philadelphia Times.