The local Lake Charles, LA television station, KPLC-Channel 7, just recently did a story on the increase of the snake population here. We have lived here for over 20 years and have not seen the number of snakes in all that time as those that have appeared here in the last 2 years. Came home from town last summer and my parents and grandkids were lined up on the porch watching a King Snake swallowing a Copperhead...amazing! They tumbled around for over 30 minutes and the Copperhead was no more... Mr. King is named appropriately.
Our property is not just surrounded by a few trees...we have a huge forest in this area ... thousands of acres of timber, including pine, oak, gum, maple, myrtle bush, magnolia, and on and on...wonderful wildlife habitat...it's a thicket, like the Big Thicket in East Texas.
This is what our 60 acres is surrounded by.
I wish there was...it's a great idea... but there is no way we could tent our trees with hardware cloth...it would not be economically feasible. There are 5 oaks right in my hen yard and 3 of 'em are over 30 ft. tall. When I taught life science for several years, we had tarantulas in a covered tank, 2 hedgehogs, a baby squirrel, and a corn snake, etc...so I don't hate snakes I love and respect animals, just in the proper setting. My hens free range from about 10 AM- 4PM. They usually...I say usually ...are not bothered by predators and I never lost one in the pastures due to a snake!