Living with Javelina!

Living with Javelina!
 

If you have had issues with pack rats - there is a good chance you have had issues with javelina!

Pack rats and javelina are both natural inhabitants of our beautiful Sonoran desert and both can be pests.

Prevention 1st!
Like pack rats - prevention goes a long way.

Limit food sources - if you provide a good food source, they will come - again & again!

• Never leave food out for javelina. Feeding javelina can cause them to lose their natural fear of people, creating a problem for the entire neighborhood.
• Don't use quail blocks where javelina can get to them
• Secure any outside trash cans so they cannot be pushed over and do not put out the trash the night before pick up.
• Consider javelina resistant plants in exposed areas. The U of A publishes a list you can find here.
• Keep your garage closed. I had three javelina in my garage destroy a bag of dog food in the middle of the day!

Limit water - unlike pack rats, javelina must have a water source within their range.

• Avoid having fountains and ponds in areas accessible to javelina.
• Avoid over watering and keep your irrigation system in good repair. Javelina LOVE mud!  Drip emitters should be buried underground with only a "pigtail" sticking out above the surface. This is a great tip for squirrels, skunks and pack rats too - all of which will bite off an exposed emitter causing a big leak the next time the system turns on. 

Limit shade - when homes are built in the desert, the environment changes. There will be more vegetation due to runoff from streets, roofs, patios and driveway. Keeping things natural actually takes work!

• Create a "buffer-zone" around your home where you trim and thin excess vegetation to maintain a more open and natural environment.
• Pay special attention to low hanging branches. Avoid umbrella-like canopies so the sun can get to the ground. 
   

The Occasional Javelina
If you encounter javelina on a walk or in your yard just follow some basic commonsense steps and enjoy their presence.

Do's & don'ts

• Never approach; enjoy from a distance. Javelina have very poor eye sight and are easily startled.  
• If you turn the corner and find yourself too close for comfort by accident just back away slowly.
• If the javelina is coming in your direction, or is an an area you where you need to go, stand still and make a loud noise by clapping your hands and shouting. In almost all cases, once the javelina knows you are there it will go away in another direction. If the javelina has young, it may make some defensive moves and noises, just to let you know to keep your distance before it leaves the area.
• NEVER walk a dog without a leash, no matter how well trained,  in an area where javelina may be present. Javelina have a great sense of smell and can smell a dog from a distance.  Coyotes are an enemy of javelina and any dog nearby can trigger an aggressive defensive response that can include charging, noise making and teeth clacking. Your dog may see this as a threat (or challenge) and respond in kind.  Javelina can be amazingly fast and the dog will come out for the worse and may be killed in a fight. If you encounter a javelina with a dog - immediately withdraw from the area. 

The Pesky Javelina
Sometimes, in spite of your best efforts, you may encounter javelina that become a reoccurring problem. What to do then? 

Two words - Behavior Modification!

Javelina are creatures of habit and can be trained to avoid an area with some simple procedures.  You just need to use their natural behavior against them.

Javelina do not like to be startled or surprised - so from a safe distance - startle and surprise them.  Good techniques - a loud cap gun or air horn.  A strong shot from a garden hose works too. You can even get a motion activated device that will send out a quick blast of water when an animal is detected in the protected zone. Here is a link to one made by Hav-a-hart.

Using a single wire charged by an electric fence transformer mounted about 8" off the ground is more extreme, but can be very effective too. 

Javelina have an excellent sense of smell - make that shot of water even more unpleasant by using a "super-soaker" type squirt gun with  some diluted (10%) vinegar or ammonia.  Do not spray javelina in the eyes, since even a diluted spray could cause damage.  Use the type of squirt gun that shoots 30-40' so you can maintain a safe distance.

You can also sprinkle some ammonia on the ground in areas javelina keep frequenting.

The key to effective behavior modification is consistency.  Once you start you have to stick to it until the javelina "learn" to avoid the area.  Inconsistent efforts may have the opposite effect and the javelina will just learn to ignore your attempts.

For more information about Javelina check out this link from Arizona Game & Fish.

Ignorance Kills

Ignorance Kills

A Great Horned Owl killed by rat poison found in the Tucson foothills

People just don't realize how dangerous rat bait can be for local wildlife.  Poison rodent bait is designed to be used only for three specific types of rodents - Roof Rats, Norway Rats and House mice.  The poison is meant to be used in urban areas and all rodenticide labels caution against the use of poison in areas where wildlife may be present.  

I think if the public really understood the danger's of rat poison to wildlife they would think twice before using or letting their exterminator use poison bait. 

The Santa Monica Mountains sit next to Los Angeles very similar to the mountain ranges outside Tucson.   A big difference is that the National Park Service has an active program to evaluate the impact rat poison on wildlife in the Santa Monica Mountains.

In just 2014 they found:

• 11 of 12 mountain lions tested positive for exposure and two died from rat poisoning.

• 93 of 105 bobcats tested positive for exposure and 70+ died from related secondary disease.

• 20 of 24 coyotes tested positive for exposure and 12 died from poisoning.

Unfortunately no one tracks wildlife poisonings in the Tucson area, but be assured the problem is no less severe. 

In general, Californians tends to be more environmentally aware and educated than other areas of the country. In part because the topic is in the news. Some excerpts from two recent California articles:

The Malibu Times, 10/1/2015
Rodenticide Poisons Mountain Lion at Point Mugu

The body of P-34 was found by a runner on Sept. 30

 at Point Mugu State Park. A necropsy proved

 the mountain lion was killed by rodenticides.

"A young mountain lion was killed in late September after ingesting rat poison that came from a poison bait box, according to authorities with the National Park Service (NPS) at the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area (SMMNRA)."

"P-34 is the latest of several larger mammals found dead as a result of rodenticide poisoning in the SMMNRA, according to the NPS, with two other mountain lions and many coyotes falling prey to what Poison Free Malibu calls the “chain of death.”

"As smaller rodents ingest poison and die, they are sometimes eaten by larger animals, such as coyotes and mountain lions, who then fall prey to the anticoagulant rodenticides found in the smaller rodents and birds."

“I think we need to work collectively to raise awareness so that people understand that when they utilize rat boxes, they understand what happens to the environment around them — to the habitat surrounding it,” another Poison Free Malibu founder, Wendi Dunn, said. “We are not separate from our environment — we are not ever. We are all part of the system.”

The MoonPark Acorn, 12/4/2015 
The Dangers of Rat Poison

SAD SIGHT—This coyote, found ill from being 

exposed to rat poison, is being cared 

for by the California Wildlife Center in Calabasas. 

"When people use anticoagulants to get rid of unwanted critters, they don’t just kill rats and mice—they also imperil wildlife, pets and children."

"Nearly all mountain lions, coyotes, bobcats, hawks, owls and other wild animals in the Santa Monica Mountains and Simi Hills are exposed to rodenticides."

“Animals suffer; they bleed internally and lose all their blood,” said Duane Tom, director of animal care at the California Wildlife Center."

"When carnivores feed on rodents that have ingested anticoagulants, they accumulate the poison in their system."

"Many animals brought to the wildlife clinic have bruising and excessive bleeding due to repeated exposure to the poisons."

“Without doubt, anticoagulants are a big concern for wildlife and also for pets. The poison is also a problem for young children. It’s not a benign thing that people just put out to get rid of mice and rats. As you poison these animals, they don’t die right away,” said Tom, who has worked at the wildlife rehabilitation facility south of Calabasas for nine years.

"Rodenticides are indiscriminate killers, and the bait boxes that contain them attract all kinds of animals.

Most coyotes, bobcats and cougars that die from mange—a skin disease caused by parasitic mites—also test positive for rodenticide exposure.

Wild predators are needed to regulate the rodent population.

If poisoning mice and rats also kills off large cats and canines, the rodent population will proliferate.

"A breeding pair of rats can result in about 15,000 rats in a year, and a pair of mice can produce up to 1 million offspring in just over a year," Mahan said in a Wildlife Center newsletter.

“Anticoagulants will worsen rodent infestation. As you poison the rodents, you’re also killing their predators. If you kill off the predators, then rodents can multiply uncontained,” Tom said.

Want to help?

Use the link below to print and share this excellent flyer produced by the National Park Service on the dangers of rat poison to local wildlife. 

Lethal Dose: Rat Poison & Local Wildlife Flyer 

Personally I think it would be great if every retail store that sold poison bait had to post a similar flyer next to the rat poison shelf. Also all exterminators should provide customers a copy before using poison bait outdoors. If consumers were aware of the true risks of poison bait to wildlife, I believe most would choose alternative methods to deal with rats.  

Kissing Bugs - Updated

Kissing Bug season is here once again!

I am re-posting this blog from last year for those who want to know more. 

Kiss Me Not!

With the warm dry nights of late May, adult kissing bugs are beginning their annual nighttime dispersal flights when they leave their homes in pack rats nests to seek mates and new hosts.  

Normally guided by starlight, the insects are easily fooled and drawn to the much brighter light emitted from homes.  As the sun rises, the kissing bugs seek any crack, crevice or other dark place to hide for the day. At night they emerge to seek food and for a kissing bug food means the blood of any sleeping or sedentary warm-blooded mammal, including humans.

What are kissing bugs?
A kissing bug is an insect and a member of a class of insects called "true bugs".  There are over 50,000+ different species of true bugs that range in size from 1mm to around 6 inches in size.  All have one thing in common - they feed on liquid through a thin proboscis, kind of like a straw with a sharp point on the end.  Most feed on plant juices, but a few feed on blood, including about 130+ species of a subfamily called Triatominae.  

Other names for this group of bugs includes cone-nose bugs, assassin bugs, and triatomines, but kissing bug is the most common.  The term comes from one very specific species, in South America that has a tendency to bite its victims around the mouth area - thus kissing bug!

If you do any research on kissing bugs, be sure you are getting information on the kissing bugs in your area. Only 12 of the 130+ species live in the United States and of those only 3 species of kissing bugs are found in the Tucson area, the most common, by far, pictured above - Triatoma rubida.   

Just as important as what is a kissing bug, is what is not a kissing bug.  We get many calls from people who think they have seen a kissing bug, but hey have not.  Of the 50,000+ true bugs species, many look very similar to kissing bugs.

The picture above is a true bug (Mozena obtusa) that feeds on mesquite trees and not blood. Here are is link to many similar looking bugs that are not kissing bugs.

Another factor to be aware of is that young immature kissing bugs look slightly different than adults. 

Some important facts on kissing bugs:

• Can be hard to identify - many other bugs look similar.
• Prefer to live with and feed on pack rats.
• As adults are confused by house lights and may enter homes through cracks.
• May also enter homes from a nearby pack rat nest, if the host rat is eliminated.
• Feed on blood from the time they are born.
• Are nocturnal and in hiding 99% of the time.
• Only "bite" to feed.
• Find victims by CO2 emitted.
• Feed like a mosquito, not like a tick.
• Bite itself is painless due to an anesthetic in insect’s saliva.
• Very similar to a mosquito bite for most people - red, itchy bump.
• Feeding takes minutes and prefers sleeping or sedentary victims.
• If disturbed while feeding, it will withdraw then reinsert its fragile proboscis resulting in a cluster bite marks.
• Only bites exposed skin, does no go under clothing or covers.
• May only feed every few weeks and be in hiding the rest of the time.
• Unless migrating to mate, as long as a host remains available, the kissing bug will remain nearby.

Why should you care?

In the Tucson area, most people really don't have to care about kissing bugs.  Unlike other parts of the world, kissing bugs here are not big disease carriers.  The bite can itch a little but is not a big deal - for most people.

Unfortunately, for a few, a bite can be deadly - about 2% to 7% of the population becomes sensitized and experience a severe allergic reaction after a second or subsequent bite. The reaction to the first bite may be mild.  The second bite has more redness and swelling. With each bite, the reaction becomes more severe and symptoms can include swelling, nausea, fever, cramps and life-threatening anaphylactic shock requiring immediate emergency medical treatment.  

What about Chagas Disease?
If you Google kissing bugs you will find a lot of scary information on kissing bugs and Chagas disease. Don't worry! For many reasons, some still not fully understood, the risk of contracting Chagas from a kissing bug bite in Arizona is extremely low. The risk is an allergic reaction is far higher.  Here is a link to some Tucson specific research done by the University of Arizona. 

What to do if you have been bitten?

If you have a reaction to a bite that is more than a small itchy bump, you should check with a doctor or if there is any doubt call Poison Control, 1-800-222-1222.  If you have a worse reaction to a subsequent bite - seek help and be prepared.  If you become sensitized, you cannot predict how you might react to the next bite.  People severely sensitized must keep an EpiPen (epinephrine auto-injector) with them at night just in case.  Many others keep some liquid Benadryl handy in case they begin to have an allergic reaction.  Any medication will just give you a few more minutes to seek medical attention.  If you think you are having an allergic reaction - seek help ASAP. 

How to eliminate and prevent kissing bugs

Pesticides inside the home are of little use for kissing bugs.  The bugs will usually be hiding in an area not typically treated with chemicals - like inside a nightstand.

If you feel you may have been bitten by a kissing bug, take a good flashlight and start looking for the engorged bug.  You will usually find it within 5-10' of where the bite occurred.  Common hiding places include between the mattress and box spring, under the box spring, behind the headboard, or under/inside a nightstand.  The bugs like cracks and crevices. Take your time, check carefully, take out drawers, turn things upside down.  If the bite came from a kissing bug, it can almost always be found with a good search.  If the bug is engorged with blood you have found the culprit.

The good news is you will usually just have one, or a few, kissing bugs inside.  Find and destroy works better than any other method.   You can also hide sticky traps (Home Depot) under the bed and furniture to check for activity.

Sticky Trap

There is a lot you can do to prevent kissing bugs:

• Prevent pack rat nests near your home through good landscaping and storage practices.
• Properly eliminate pack rats nests near your home.
• Minimize light showing outside at night when it is hot and dry.
• Use "bug" bulbs for outside porch lights.
• Make sure doors and windows seal tightly.
• Caulk crack and crevices on the outside of the home that might allow bugs inside.

The worse method of control – poisoning the pack rats! 

Poison may kill a pack rat, but it also leaves behind hungry kissing bugs and does nothing to remove the nest which will just be reoccupied by another rat.   Poison also moves up the food chain and kills the animals that naturally control pack rats, practically – hawks & owls!

Must See Pack Rat Video!

Must See Pack Rat Video

Pack rat issues? This short video is the best place to start. In two minutes you can gain a basic understanding why pack rats do what they do and how to best stop them.

I hope you find it enjoyable and informative. If you like the production values and think your business could benefit from an "explainer" video be sure to check out Pendulum Swing Media.

Kiss Me Not!

Kiss Me Not!

With the warm dry nights of late May, adult kissing bugs are beginning their annual 
nighttime dispersal flights when they leave their homes in pack rats nests to seek mates and new hosts.  

Normally guided by starlight, the insects are easily fooled and drawn to the much brighter light emitted from homes.  As the sun rises, the kissing bugs seek any crack, crevice or other dark place to hide for the day. At night they emerge to seek food and for a kissing bug food means the blood of any sleeping or sedentary warm blooded mammal, including humans.

What are kissing bugs?
A kissing bug is an insect and a member of a class of insects called "true bugs".  There are over 50,000+ different species of true bugs that range in size from 1mm to around 6 inches in size.  All have one thing in common - they feed on liquid through a thin proboscis, kind of like a straw with a sharp point on the end.  Most feed on plant juices, but a few feed on blood, including about 130+ species of a subfamily called Triatominae.  

Other names for this group of bugs includes cone-nose bugs, assassin bugs and triatomines, but kissing bug is the most common.  The term comes from one very specific species, in South America that has a tendency to bite its victims around the mouth area - thus kissing bug!

If you do any research on kissing bugs, be sure you are getting information on the kissing bugs in your area. Only 12 of the 130+ species live in the United States and of those only 3 species of kissing bugs are found in the Tucson area, the most common, by far, pictured above - Triatoma rubida.   

An excellent web site which covers these species in depth is published by the University of Arizona and can be found http://neurosci.arizona.edu/kissingbugproject.  This blog pertains only to these three species.

Just as important as what is a kissing bug, is what is not a kissing bug.  We get many calls from people who think they have seen a kissing bug, but hey have not.  Of the 50,000+ true bugs species, many look very similar to a kissing bugs.

A true bug, but not a kissing bug!

The picture above is a boxelder bug.  It feeds on plants juices and not blood. Here is an entire gallery of similar looking bugs that are not kissing bugs.


Another factor to be aware of is that young immature kissing bugs look slightly different than adults. 

Some important facts on kissing bugs:

• Can be hard to identify - many other bugs look similar.
• Prefer to live with and feed on pack rats.
• As adults are confused by house lights and may enter homes through cracks.
• May also enter homes from a nearby pack rat nest, if the host rat is eliminated.
• Feed on blood from the time they are born.
• Are nocturnal and in hiding 99% of the time.
• Only "bite" to feed.
• Find victims by CO2 emitted.
• Feed like a mosquito, not like a tick.
• Bite itself is painless due an anesthetic in insect’s saliva.
• Very similar to a mosquito bite for most people - red, itchy bump.
• Feeding takes minutes and prefers sleeping or sedentary victims.
• If disturbed while feeding, it will withdraw then reinsert its fragile proboscis resulting in a cluster bite marks.
• Only bites exposed skin, does no go under clothing or covers.
• May only feed every few weeks, and be in hiding the rest of the time.
• Unless migrating to mate, as long as a host remains available, the kissing bug will remain nearby.

Why should you care?

In the Tucson area, most people really don't have to care about kissing bugs.  Unlike other parts of the world, kissing bugs here are not big disease carriers.  The bite can itch a little, but is not a big deal - for most people.

Unfortunately, for a few, a bite can be deadly - about 2% to 7% of the population becomes sensitized and experience a severe allergic reaction after a second or subsequent bite. The reaction to the first bite may be mild.  The second bite has more redness and swelling. With each bite the reaction becomes more severe and  symptoms can include swelling, nausea, fever, cramps and life threatening anaphylactic shock requiring immediate emergency medical treatment.  

What to do if you have been bitten?

If you have a reaction to a bite that is more then a small itchy bump, you should check with a doctor or if there is any doubt call Poison Control, 1-800-222-1222.  If you have a worse reaction on a subsequent bite - seek help and be prepared.  If you become sensitized, you cannot predict how you might react to the next bite.  People severely sensitized must keep an EpiPen (epinephrine auto-injector) with them at night just in case.  Many others keep some liquid benadryl handy in case they begin to have an allergic reaction.  Any medication will just give you a few more minutes to seek medical attention.  If you think you are having an allergic reaction - seek help ASAP. 

How to eliminate and prevent kissing bugs

Pesticides inside the home are of little use for kissing bugs.  The bugs will usually be hiding in an area not typically treated with chemicals - like inside a nightstand.

If you feel you may have been bitten by a kissing bug, take a good flashlight and start looking for the engorged bug.  You will usually find it within 5-10' of where the bite occurred.  Common hiding places include between the mattress and box spring, under the box spring, behind the headboard, or under/inside a nightstand.  The bugs like cracks and crevices. Take your time, check carefully, take out drawers, turn things upside down.  If the bite came from a kissing bug, it can almost always be found with a good search.  If the bug is engorged with blood you have found the culprit.

The good news is you will usually just have one, or a few, kissing bugs inside.  Find and destroy works better than any other method.   You can also hide sticky traps (Home Depot) under the bed and furniture to check for activity.

Sticky Trap

There is a lot you can do to prevent kissing bugs:

• Prevent pack rat nests near your home through good landscaping and storage practices.
• Properly eliminate pack rats nests near your home.
• Minimize light showing outside at night when it is hot and dry.
• Use "bug" bulbs for outside porch lights.
• Make sure doors and windows seal tightly.
• Caulk crack and crevices on the outside of the home that might allow bugs inside.

Worse method of control – poisoning the pack rats! 

Poison may kill a pack rat, but it also leaves behind hungry kissing bugs and does nothing to remove the nest which will just be reoccupied by another rat.   Poison also moves up the food chain and kills the animals that naturally control pack rats, practically – hawks & owls!

Itsy-bitsy-teeny-weeny rattlesnake!

A while back I was cleaning out a pack rat nest and I saw something shiny.  It was tiny and at first I thought it was a shell like the type pictured below.  People will bring shells home from the beach, leave them out on the patio and the pack rats will take a few for their nests.  After all they are "pack rats"!

I was not surprised since I have seen shells in rats nests many times, but I wasn't a 100% sure because I was standing above it and it was in the dirt and small.  What I saw was more like this:

I bent over to pick the "shell up" and saw it was a very little snake.  My next thought was "oh, its a harmless blind night snake". Not uncommon, but I had never seen one coiled  up before. Usually they are more worm-like.  So I took a  very close look and saw this:

It was an itsy-bitsy-teeny-weeny rattlesnake!  How tiny?  Here it is next to by business card:

The amazing thing is that the little guy was just as feisty and aggressive as any other rattlesnake. He would shake his tail just like an adult, but was too little to have a rattle. Here is a picture of him taking a strike at my snake tongs:

Tiny as he was, his bite can be just as deadly as any other rattlesnake.  Some say more deadly, because baby snakes have not learned how to regulate their venom like an adult can.  I have seen many rattlesnakes, including a fair number of young small snakes, but I have never seen out this small before or since.   I carefully moved him a safe distance away and hope he has a long life without further human contact.

The Tiger Rattlesnake

The Tiger rattlesnake takes the prize for the highest toxicity of venom in the western hemisphere and produces a neurotoxin essentially identical to the Mohave rattlesnake along with a myotoxin that causes muscular necrosis.  However, the Tiger rattlesnake is notoriously reclusive and reluctant to strike unless intentionally provoked.  Most people will go their entire lives in southern Arizona and never see one.  As of this date, I have only encountered two in my entire career!

Wikipedia - Tiger Rattlesnake

Do you know the official Arizona State mammal?

Arizona has an official state flower (Saguaro blossom), bird (Cactus Wren) and even a state mammal - the Ringtail - often called a ringtail cat because of its cat like features.

The above photo is a rare site.  Ringtails are common, but also nocturnal and usually very secretive.   Since ringtails are omnivores whose diet includes pack rats, we occasionally trap a ringtail when we are are trapping pack rats.  Since we use live catch traps, the ringtails are unharmed and always released.  The ringtail above was trapped at a pack rat entry point in an attic.  When released, she quickly climbed a tree and posed for a picture.

Ringtails are actually part of the coon family, as you can tell by the tail.  To learn more about ringtails you may want to check out these links:

Desert Museum fact-sheet Ringtail

Wikipedia - Ring-tailed cat

Unlike pest control companies, Mr. Pack Rat has a special use permit from Arizona Game & Fish to be able to legally trap ringtails and other select wildlife.

We may only see 1-2 ringtails a year.  The most interesting situation was ringtail in the library of Catalina Foothills High School.  It sneaked in when the janitors left the back door open while cleaning.  When something got into the librarian's lunch left overnight, the school suspected a pack rat.  Turned out to be a ringtail which was living under an interior book drop. The ringtail was trapped and released just outside the library.  

The most recent ringtail we caught was at Canyon Ranch in an power equipment room with four walls, but no roof.  The room is full of utility equipment where the year before a racoon actually caused a brown-out when it squeezed into hole on the side of a 480 volt breaker box.  The racoon did not survive.  The hole was sealed, but the resort did not want to take a chance when evidence of another critter appeared and they called Mr. Pack Rat.  I determined from the scat, the animal was a ringtail.  It was safely trapped and in this case relocated in a designated wildlife area a few miles away.

What is even rarer than seeing a ringtail is hearing one.  Below is a short clip of a ringtail before release and you can see they not only have cat like features, they also sound somewhat like a cat. They are truly amazing creatures. You can also see they do not like to be in a cage and it always gives me great joy to set them free.

Snake Surprise!

The other day I had an unexpected encounter with a rattle snake - in January!

From March to November we often come across rattle snakes. Snakes eat rats and snakes like to hide in dark protected areas. What better place to live than in a rat nest - a cozy home and dinner comes to you.

When the weather gets cooler, snakes usually move into winter dens, often in rocky areas with an eastern exposure to catch the morning sun. It is not unusual for multiple snakes to nest together in the cold. When dealing with rat nests in rocky areas, I am always on guard regardless of the time of year.

On this inspection I was in a nicely landscaped area. There was a plastic storage container just a few inches from the house sitting on gravel. Never a good idea, because pack rats love narrow spaces and the gap between the wall of the house and the storage bin was perfect. The rats use the sheltered area to dig in and make a home either in or under the storage bin.

Sure enough there where signs of digging behind the bin, so I reached down to slide the container away from the wall to explore further. The bin was full of items and heavy, so I had to slip my hand under the edge lift, as I moved it over the gravel.

To my surprise there was a rattle snake just inches from where I had put my hand.

Fortunately, the weather was sunny but cool and the snake was lethargic. I grabbed my snake tongs and moved it a safe distance away from the home in a sunny area with lots of nearby shelter.

Two valuable lessons learned. The home owner learned not to put storage containers next to the house and I learned to NEVER assume it is safe to not be on guard for snakes regardless of the time of year or location.

Kris