mr.72 wrote:
I know this gets way off the topic at hand but the myth that cottonmouths are overly aggressive has been thoroughly debunked.
While I see your point, I disagree with it based perhaps on the measurement of "aggession."
I've got a pair of boots that has two fang hole through the top leather from one that struck at me. Granted, it felt threated by my getting into close proximity to it. However, I didn't even see the snake move before it struck.
My father had one literally jump from a tree limb on the river at his head a month ago. My mother was running the motor and "gunned" the boat to avoid the strike. As it was told to me, the thing sprang from the overhanging limb with its mouth open and headed straight for my father's face. The limp was enough away that that cottonmouth SHOULDN'T have felt threatened.
Last year, I had one in my yard that literally sprang at me from over 10 feet away while I was moving in another direction.
My point to all of this?
I think the definition of "aggession" needs to be re-defined. MOST creatures only attack when they either A.) are hunting or B.) feel threatened. I'll assume that the cottonmouths that I've mentioned were not hunting us. That leaves feeling threatened.
As I see it, an overly developed sense of being threatened and attacking as a result DOES qualify as agression in the sense that it poses a very real danger.
Besides...
Is getting killed by a cottonmouth that is aggressive somehow worse than getting killed by one that has an overdeveloped sense of threat? (Death IS potential from a cottonmouth) It becomes a issue of symantics.
Even so, I've dealt with a lot of poisonous snakes in my life, and cottonmouths are the ONLY ones that I've routinely seen this "aggression" out of.
As Okiecruffler mentioned, they DO tend to be the most "cranky" around here.
Researchers can debunk all they want. I'll belive my lying eyes over them.
-- John
