Snakes

[gswhiteley]

Every weekend I'm finding copperhead snakes in my yard .......usually just the babies, less than 10". I've tried the rubber owls and snake-away...not working.

Aside from getting a cat, anyone have any ideas?

[bubbaroski]

I had snakes under the house until I started putting mothballs under the house.

[Troy]

.......usually just the babies, less than 10"

Be careful, I just wonder where the mother is :-)

[amillertools]

snakes are really tough. I had them at my old house, and I hate to discourage you, but I never figured out a way to completely get rid of them. let me know if something works for you!

[ABP]

Mothballs are good , I was watching "Dirty Jobs" on the Discovery channel and some company called Vexcon was using moth balls to get rid of snakes
I could not find a good link, so copy and paste this in a search engine and go from there, these people are REAL good

Bill Bretherton, owner of Vexcon Animal & Pest Control

[DonnaJim23]

Try using mothballs, it really helps!

[berrymilan]

I am agree with Donna Jim. You should try to go for mothballs. I am sure it 'll be the best option for you.

[stefen]

Mothballs can solve your problem but still you should careful as you have small baby. Take care!!!!!!!!!!

[JRH]

Mothballs Under House

Be careful using mothballs under any structure you spend much time in. Breathing mothball fumes can ruin your health. Mothball fumes will impregnate the wood under the house and give off vapors for a long time. These vapors are harmful to your family over time. Can cause severe liver and blood damage.

Just a word of caution

[NightBird]

Hi:

First thing to remember is that if you have snakes you have the critters that the snakes eat. If you get rid of all the snakes you'll soon notice those critters causing trouble. If you poison the other critters you'll risk poisoning anything that scavenges them or hunts them. So be aware and consider what you're doing.

2nd. You need to be sure that what you have truly are copper heads as young corn snakes are often misidentified as copper heads. They tend to be aggressive. Doing things like rattling their tails in the leaves to scare you and striking at anything that actually molests them. They often have a very beautyful and distinctive redish "copper" color and along with their pattern can cause confusion. One thing to note is that they have a very distinctive pattern on their heads that "Copper heads" do NOT have. Also the heads have slightly different shapes. Their territories often overlap.

Now the mothball trick is supposed to work well for everything including scunks, possums and rats but you need to use the original Naptha based mothballs. I successfully used it to make sure that some of the above quit using the underside of a mobile home that I once owned for a nursery.

Another Less Toxic and expensive option is sulpher powder. This is supposed to drive snakes out and has the additional benifit that chiggers and some other biting insects don't like it. It is also supposed to have a minimal effect on critters higher on the food chain and some plants are supposed to "like" it.

I would spread it in stages over a week or two moving out from the house to help drive them off the area rather than trap them in the area. Start underneath if you believe that they are denning there. You don't have much time left as it is getting close to winter.

The disadvantage is that sulpher has to be reapplied periodicly but once you get them out of the area you can apply a thick perimeter, a fence, of the stuff to keep them out and not have to put it out as often.

I hope this helps

Sincerely, NightBird.

[NightBird]

I was looking this over and saw that the original post was from 2006 but the info should still be helpful.