The Democratic banner. (Mt. Vernon, Ohio) 1898-192?, 1915-10-01

About Snakes And Other
Dreaded ScrpcntS
charleston News and Courier)

Fish stories never lack fascination |
and snake stories are not bit less al
Turing. With the world rocking in the
throes of it's mightiest war and the
newspapers filled day after day with
the epic narratives of mighty battles
on the sea and and, readers of The
News and Courier have yet found time
amid the din to prove that they are
nightly stirred up over a snake story
appearing in these columns some days
ago in the form of dispatch from "a
South Carolina town alleging that the
female rattlesnake has no rattles. So
warm are the controversies to which
this statement has given rise that it
seems advisable, in the interest of
peace and hTrmony, to touch upon GER
tain facts of snake lore.
There arc three kinds Of rattle
snakes in South Carolina-the dia-
mond-back rattlesnake, the timber rat
tlesnake, and the ground or pigmy rat
tlesnake. In each of these species -
as we'll as in the ten other species of
rattlesnakes found IN North America
both male and female nave rattles.
The rattleless "rattlesnake," which
started all the discussion, was evident
ly not rattlesnake al all, but cop
perhead, known also as highland moe
casin, and poisonous species. Meth
er sex of the copperhead has rattles,
and the term pilot rattlesnake," often
applied to the copperhead, is mis-
nomer, as the copperhead is not rat
tlesnake, but instead mOccasin. 1t
should not be corerTe1 with it's cousin,
the water col1'n 0r cottonmouth
moccasin, common especially in the
low country of the state, and also pois-
onous. Nor should the cotton-mouth
moccasin be confused, as it generally
is, with the several species of harm
less water snakes found in the state.
The water rattler," for instance, is
neither a rattlesnake living in the wat
er, as one would Judge from it's com
mon name, nor variety of poisonous
moccasin, as any low-country darky
will insist that it is, but instead per
) fectly harmless species known as the
. banded watersnake. A variety of this
species, common in South Carolina ant
! also harmless, Is the red-bellied water
snake.
These facts are set forth with the
) idea of settling controversy, but II
may we'll turn out that they will leat
to new disputes. Most people know
! no more about snakes than they de-
about Balkan politics, but they have
certain beliefs and theories and they
/ will stick to these through thick ant
thin. 1t would be easier to capture
Gibraltar single-handed than to per
/ suade the average man that the spread
! ing adder is not only monpoisonous
! but that 1t cannot be- induced to bite
that the much-dreaded scorpion" o
our woods is an absolutely harmless
little lizzard-as, indeed, are all th'
: other species of lizard found in th
. ton of the Gila monster of the South
. west; that the "coachwhip" snake nev
er whipped anybody or anything t.
death; that the young Of great man,
, snakes, including the rattlesnake, ar
, born instead of being hatched from
eggs: that you cannot tell a rattle
: snakes age by the number of his raj
$ tles or that the rattlesnake is i'm
. mune to his own poison and that, there
t fore, you cannot make him commi
suicide by tickling him with sticI
and causing him to bite himself
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