terrified in Arizona
 

Are there rattlesnakes anywhere in arizona or Utah? We're planning on going to Sedona, grand canyon, lake powell and maybe Bryce over Thanksgiving. If there are, I'll have to change plans.

Guess you should go to Hawaii, where htere are NO snakes. There are rattle snakes everywhere in the west, even in the suburbs. The good news is I've never seen one, and we often go to horse ranches and spend days on horseback or hiking in rattler country. Have heard them rattling, but they prefer to sleep and don't go out chasing people!

I've been here 65 years and am the same as Icuy, heard the rattle, but haven't seen the snake......I think by the time you get here, they will be underground for winter, but you never know, they don't want to see you either.

I lived in snake country for many years and never saw one. I wouldnt worry too much unless you are a field mouse.:-d

Agree w/ all the others. Rattlers are very common in my area of N. California yet I have never seen one except in a zoo.

And in many trips to Arizona I have never seen one. There are rattle snakes ALL OVER the western USA - but they are not looking for humans. relax and enjoy your trip.

My son lives in Arizona and his dog was recently bitten by a rattlesnake while they were out hiking. My son says that you should be fine...as long as you don't bark at the snakes and try to play with them.

This is something I forgot to worry about before we made similar trip in August. All I worried about was falling into Bryce or Grand Canyons. Be sure to buy the book "Death in the Grand Canyon" - a big seller at area gift shops. Gives you about a century's worth of things to worry about. (We did not see any snakes, even during our hiking and horse ride, although the horse ride guy told us about snakes in Bryce area)

Gail: That was VERY good :D

Icuy:Out here in the West, if you ever meet with a rattlesnake, it's a race to see who - you or the rattlesnake - can outrun the other in fleeing away!

I, unlike some of the other posters, have seen a rattlesnake. It was in a campground and the snake was spotted by a group of young children who had no idea what they had found. Fortunately, the ranger did. He appeared with a long handled shovel, calmly told the children to move away, and chopped the head off the snake with one smooth, swift blow. Blood spewed, children squealed, and the body of the snake - about 6 to 8 foot long - writhed and flopped for a very long time. Poor snake!

You probably have a better chance of being hit by lightening, given the extraordinary number of lightening storms we've had this year, than of being bitten by a rattlesnake.

You are going to some of the most beautiful spots in this country. Please don't change your plans!

jason888 - here we all are trying to calm down poor 1441 and you have to tell him about a rattler terrorizing kids and blood spewing. Nice going :-)

LOL Janis!
BTW Jason one question....Did it taste like chicken?? :-d

Yes there are rattlesnakes in the Southwest. We have a house in Palm Springs, CA and have, over the years seen many snakes. The house is on the hillside surrounded by desert. Once we had a rattler coiled up by our pool, came across one crossing the road up to our house. The most exciting snake adventure was when we had a large group coming to dinner at our house. The kids saw one just down the path from our house. The Dads got a little excited, beheaded the thing, skinned it (streching the skin out on a board to dry so that the kids could take it back to school), then they gutted it and put it on the barbeque for dinner. You should have seen the line up when the barbeque was done!! That is a lesson in survival of the fittest, eating your enemy!

Icuy: My apologies, I thought you were the original poster

Janis and 1441: My MOST humble apologies!

What can I plead but a very bad case of "fodoritis"? Here I am, trying to plan for our next trip, and I spend so much time reading the Fodor messages I have completely lost perspective!

panhandle: one of the other campers took the snake and his group had a fine meal that night. We heard a lot of laughter from their camp that night.

I did have rattlesnake at a fancy-smancy restaurant in Washington DC. Yes, you're right! - it tasted like chicken. So did Caribbean turtle at the same restaurant. Kind of boring, huh?

I'm not afraid of snakes which comes in handy living in south Louisiana, but if I remember correctly snakes become much more scarce once you've hit 4000 ft altitude? I've never seen a snake in Utah.

Several of my relatives living anywhere from 6000-8500 levels in southern Utah would be very surprised to hear snakes are rare at higher elevations. I've seen a few in my 2-3 times a year visits but local residents see them frequently.

Their are small volcanic cones throughout the area my family lives (holes anywhere from 3-8 feet deep) and you can often find nests of rattlers in these cones (whence came the term "snake pit"?). You can often see them as you are hiking in the hills and we even had a big rattler curled up on the front porch one morning when we awoke (we just used a shovel to flip him/her off the porch and he went on his way).

Having said all that, I agree with most everyone else who says the snakes will do all they can to get out of your way. I wear leather high top boots when I hike in snake country and I'm careful where I put my hands and feet, especially when climbing over a log or rock, and I think these are all the precautions you need to take.

My advice is to take sensible precautions and enjoy yourself. It's all too easy to get more paranoid than you need to be.

Been out west numerous times over the years. With common sense I've never had any problems with wildcats, snakes, scorpions, lizards, you name it. I've found that most people that have bad encounters with the animal kingdom is due to stupidity.

OK, 1441 has asked variations of this question three times over the last 2 days and has gotten multiple answers on all of them. But he just keeps posting w/o coming back to the threads. In fact he hasn't posted back on any of his threads. Did we scare him off?

We couldn't possibly have scared him off. He was "terrified" to start with!

I live in Austin TX and have seen 2 rattlesnakes. Once in the field behind my house - it was about 4 feet long. EWWW. Then my DH brought one (dead) in the house to show me that he mowed over the other day. Nice guy.

I've eaten rattlesnake cakes (like crabcakes). Delicious!

You know, I took a very lengthy hike in Sabino Canyon (Tucson) not too long ago, and I didn't see much of anything in the way of crispy crunchys or creepy crawlers. Lots of saguaros, sure, but nothing even remotely interested in biting, stinging or bugging me. Everyone's giving the OP great advice, so hopefully they'll chill out.

Rattlesnake, like alligator and frog's legs, tastes like chicken (slightly meatier consistency, as I recall). Good rubs, a little sauce and a few beers helps the flavor immensely. Bon appétit!!

There you go, 1441!

Now you know from several posters what to do if you should come face to face with a rattlesnake - EAT IT!

And rjw has given you the perfect accompaniments! :)