Spirit - the amazing grey dewlap toulouse gander!

[Marty1876]

We used to have copperheads too, but I think that the ducks and chickens and turkeys and geese all eat what they'd eat, so since there is nothing they want there, they stay elsewhere. No bugs, no mice, no snacks. OK, we also get blacksnakes / ratsnakes, but not very often. I think the turkeys eat them. I found two dead snakes in the yard, and they were picked to death.

 

[Miss Lydia]

We used to have copperheads too, but I think that the ducks and chickens and turkeys and geese all eat what they'd eat, so since there is nothing they want there, they stay elsewhere. No bugs, no mice, no snacks. OK, we also get blacksnakes / ratsnakes, but not very often. I think the turkeys eat them. I found two dead snakes in the yard, and they were picked to death.

Yep, they not only eat the bad bugs and snakes but the ones that are good to have around, I love Preying mantis and use to have quite a bit of them, only saw one youngster this summer and he probably got ate.

 

[Iain Utah]

Lydia, crocodile dundee would indeed be proud of you. I personally would be quite happy to never see another snake, good or bad. Fortunately, we do not have many snakes, although some areas of Utah have a lot of rattlers. Those scare the bejeezy out of me.

 

[Triplell]

When I lived in California we had a lot of the western diamondback rattlers. I used to go around and kill all I could find until I went on a moutain nature hike with a naturalist. He asked me if after I killed then did I see an influx of mice and rats. YUP!!! Basically I messed with mother nature and things got out of balance . I wont do that again. They have the rattles for a reason to warn you of their presence. Now in northern(really central) Minnesota we have the rat snake and the gardner snake. I feel real bad when I run one over with the lawn mower. I have even so far as put several gardner snakes inside the barn to help with the mouse problem, and it helped!!!! Now the mice are under control and I only kill about 2-3 a week before that was about every half-hour. Talk about scarry things.... in Calif we had the black-widow but here in MN we have the brown barn spider. We are talking small balck-widow and gigantic brown barn spiders and very poisonous. Once a month I clean every cob-web I can find in the barn, even if I have to climb a 20 ft ladder to make sure I have none of those darn things.

 

[Marty1876]

Here in Kansas we've got 32 snakes, and only 4 poisonous ones. We get brown recluse spiders (which really hide, thus the name) and black widows in summer. I don't ever kill snakes, since I studied biology and did my undergrad biomed (KBRIN) research on albino cornsnakes. The mouse population caries bubonic plague, so let the snakes have them by golly! In my house, we kill lots of mus musculous (not to be confused with actual mice - they really aren't the same). They look the same, but if they are side by side, you'll see that true mice have longer tails, where mus have shorter tails, and are gray, not a nice brown or dark tawny color. A true mouse wouldn't be caught dead in your house, just the mus. If you have mice, and bugs, you'll have snakes, and let them be. Besides, most snakes really just want to get away from you, so I let them. If you have bad venomous snake problems, bring in king snakes, and they eat them. (really) They'll even nail a rattler, but in some places, rattlers are all you have. Right here I get both prarie and timber rattlers, since I'm between the true prarie (with the flint hills only 15 miles away) and the treed area of Kansas is about 15 miles the other way.

However, I've never seen either on my property here, but I find them out by the river a lot. You can almost step on them, and they won't strike. (esp. early in the a.m. or at sunset, except in high summer when its so warm they don't slow down at night.) I definately get more copperheads here. The only other poisonous snake is the water moccasin, and its actually up North, so I've never seen one here, Thanks God!!!

The turkeys are the very devil with the snakes, so I don't think I ran over a single garden snake this year, but I've got a couple living by my goldfish pond. In the summer the geese scared the bejebus out of them, too!!! They sun themselves on the rocks by the big and little pond, and the geese just troop in and swim, and don't care if a snake is there or now. They've toppled the poor things into the pond a few times, and I had to resuce one. I put some stuff for them to get out in the corner, but now the geese use that for climbing in and out too. Poor little snakies.

I used to get lots of frogs too, but I think the turkeys nailed them too. I havn't actually seen the geese eat any amphibians yet.

 

[Triplell]

I wish I could let the geese in the swamp and eat till they explode but we have to many fox,coyte's,mink and other things. It really holds the water in the spring but slowly dries up in the summer. We have some high ground in there too and the grass is just the bomb. This year I plan on letting the geese and the ducks out in the barn yard so they can fertilize that area too. I can't wait to see how the hay fields look after having cows in then all summer long. Dad plans on getting some dirt in so I can make my low ground level so the water don't sit and make mud puddles. Dad owns the farm and he puts up with my poultry. My husband and I live with him other wise he will have to sell it, just to much for a 72 yrs old man with health problems to take of by himself. He does get a big kick from the ducks and chickens. The jury is still out about the geese. Tonight the temps are 0 F and tommarrow going into the -'s. No fun but I bundle up and away I go. Finally the geese have used the hay that I put down for them to sleep on.

Oh by the way the geese have stopped fighting that they are outside. I leave the barn door open if they want to go in during the day, the ducks just go in and out all day long.

 

[Miss Lydia]

I like snakes actually, i wouldn't want to live with one but i think they are cool. I have even left a duck egg outside as a treat for the big Blackie as we call him/or her . Just cause she is so good to keep down the rat and mouse pop. Thanks Marty for clarifying about the lil rodents and their difference, so is a vole the same as mus? everyonce in a while when I'm sitting outside watching the flock I'll catch a glimpse of one of them sneaking some feed, but they have to be fast because the chickens usually get them.

 

[Marty1876]

Voles and shrews (both here in US) are different from mus and mice. There is a whole groups of the little varments. Voles have even shorter tales, and shrews are tiny, they look like little little mice, but they are super aggresive and will bite you as soon as look at you.

 

[Going Bhonkers]

Voles and shrews (both here in US) are different from mus and mice. There is a whole groups of the little varments. Voles have even shorter tales, and shrews are tiny, they look like little little mice, but they are super aggresive and will bite you as soon as look at you.

I never heard of a mus. Is that pronounced like the word "must" but without the letter T ?

 

[Marty1876]

Yes, pronounced like Must without a T. Its mus musculous, or the house mouse, but its not a true mouse at all. They can be friendlied up and made into pets even, and this was very commen 300 years ago, folks let them live in their hair, and fed them. They also helped spread the plague throughout Europe. They rather dropped in popularity as pets then, for obvious reasons. They aren't as clever or swift as a mouse, so cats catch them easier. A real mouse (mice) can jump several feet up or down, fly by you like greased lightening, and have a variety of shades, plus pale underbellies. A mus in pretty much a uniform grayish color (light gray to almost black, but all over and under).

I'm a vast encyclpedia of useless infromation. Ask me anything, LOL.