The Wrangell sentinel., 1935-04-19

To some, rattlesng &es and sand hills may seem a little foreign. However. have found them so in termingled that whenever thinking of one, my mind reyerts to the other. Perhaps this may be partly because it was in and around the sandhill regions, along quicksand streams and the surrounding bad lands of Montana that I waged a one-man war on those pesky rat iers.
 n'rhaps you may wonder just
 yyeloped this unsated hun sel TOT killing rattlsrs.
 In the course of my wanderings I have found almost every part of this great land of ours to have some manner of pest, and to my way of thinking there are none quite so undesirable as snakes.
 Rattlesnake to Dinner
 will venture to say that there are but few cooks who have ever had their kitchen invaded by rattlesnakes. However, that very thing helped to bring on the killing crusade.
 While preparing t e evening meal at one of the large ranches where l worked some years ago, had occasion to open one Of the cupboards where various pots and pans were stored and in my search for the desired receptacle l was suddenly startled by hearing the unmistakable b-r-r-r-r-r of a rattle snake. Jumping back, I seized the iron poker and quickly hooked the pans aside. There lay an immense rattler ready and very anxious to strike some one. Needless to say that he got what Paddy gave the drum.
 I found where he had crawled up through a rat hole in the floor at the bottom of the cupboard. Nat urally, supper was almost forgotten in our search for his mate. In short while one of the boys saw 1t poke it's wicked head from a hole at the side of the house. Although they failed to get him they stirred up such a eommotion that he left.
 Some days later while out on the hillside back of the large old ranch house, 1 saw a wicked look ing snake streaking it towards the house. On heading him off with my club, he came straight at me. saw that it was a very strange nf ,f It proved to be a spreading adder, the only one l ever saw in those parts.
 One day l heard an awful com- motion down by the chicken house. Grabbing up a long stick which happened to lie near, l ran to a small slat chicken coop from which issued a lond sQuawking and flut- tering of wings. Imagine my sur prise to find a large rattlesnake coiled menacingly in one end of the coop while the hen was fran ticaly trying to get out the other end. Evidently, the rattler was con- templating on having a chicken dinner.
 l quickly upset the coop to see the hen go Hopping and squawking away-while the rattler set him. self for his deadly leap. However, my club got in its work and sent him into the land of Nod.
 Target Practice
 Somehow this snake killing got into my blood and I got to feeling like I wanted to exterminate the whole of them. Consequently when I started out hunting coyotes and wolves, I just naturally took to looking for rattlers also. Of course they were not in evidence during the winter months however, during the spring and summer, found plenty of them to keep in target practice and permit me to say that the head of a rattler is a pretty fine target, darting in and out those coils with lightning speed.
 Predatory Hunting
 AS many seasons went drifting by we watched the number of slain coyotes and wolves grow into hun dreds, and although there was no bounty on those pesky rattlers Ga