Hi i couldn't believe it when i looked in and saw this... Is there anyway i can get rid of these things without hurting chickens?? This one must've been at least 4ft long... i'm sure there's more if this thing was in there..I got it and killed it.. I'm in Maryland and they say these are much better than the copperhead.. they say if you have these than not to worry about copperheaads... Is this true??? sorry to ask stupid question but i scared of these and i love my chickens... thanks Maureen

-- MAUREEN (onemaur@yahoo.com), July 31, 2001

Answers

Blacksnakes are just a common problem in the hen house. We kill one or so each year. They will swallow your baby chicks just as easy. We just take a sharp hoe to their heads. There kind of tuff to kill, as you know now, like beating on an old tire. I'm sure there are some who will say--oh, oh, don't kill those valuable snakes. Well, come get them then, let them feed on your eggs. As to copperheads--- we have blacksnakes and copperheads a plenty. I control both populations when they make a pest of themselves. So guess that rules out blacksnakes controlling the copperhead in any big way. Don

-- Don (dairyagri@yahoo.com), July 31, 2001.

Maureen, you have more than one large black species of snake in your area. By the way snakes are valuable to our existance and they are easy to relocate if you just don't want one around. If you will post a query on the "KIngsnake herp forum" and go to the snake section someone there can ID the snake for you. Please don't kill them unless you feel you are in danger from venomous species. I relocate those too as I would rather have the occasional snake around than be ankle deep in mice or rats! Snakes cannot give you any kind of disease, mice and rat-bourne diseased have wiped out millions! Check with the nice people at the snake forum and relax. :) Also, if this occures again, e mail me and I'll tell you how to easily catch the snake with no direct involment on your part. :)

-- Little Quacker (carouselxing@juno.com), July 31, 2001.

Hello, I just killed a 6' black snake that the dog 'found' for me in the garden! IMHO, the only good snake is a dead snake! I haven't heard this about having black snakes --no copperheads! We have both. We do have a pair of King snakes, in our barn, that my husband would divorce me, if I killed them. We haven't had a problem with c'heads since they have come to stay--so maybe it's true! (We have killed 100's of copperheads in the last 28 years at our farm, but none in the last two years!!!) We also have been very "clean" --no tall grass, no piles of things on the ground --everything is up on racks. bushes and trees are trim close and we have dogs that 'patrol' the whole farm! They will alert us if they find one!

-- Debbie T in N.C. (rdtyner@mindspring.com), July 31, 2001.

We got black snakes nesting in our barns and under our old farmhouse, never hardly see them, but they are there. Other folks around here have a big problem with copperheads, but we don't, due to our black snakes in residence.

We also have chickens, and have never had black snakes in the henhouse, we keep all grass/weeds mowed and weed-whacked back short around all buildings, I think that helps alot to keep the snakes where they belong.

-- Annie Miller in SE OH (annie@1st.net), July 31, 2001.

You can buy wooden eggs inexpensively at feed stores. The idea is to keep one or two in the nest at all times and if the snake eats it, it's supposed to kill the snake. Keep your real eggs gathered regularly. I also have no use for a snake in the henhouse, as they will eat baby chicks three at a time. (And if you keep litter in the coop, they are apt to slither under the stuff where you can't see them.)

-- mary (marylgarcia@aol.com), July 31, 2001.

Let the black snakes be. Consider the occassional lost egg or even chick as the price you pay for living out in the country, close to nature. Being scared of something, be it spiders, snakes, or whatever, is not a good enough reason to kill it. Mind you, I'm not talking about poisonous snakes lurking around the house. Killing those can be considered self-defense. But black snakes won't hurt you, and you should tolerate them.

-- Shannon at Grateful Acres Animal Sanctuary (gratacres@aol.com), July 31, 2001.

A black snake once ate 9 of our baby chicks (ones we had really looked forward to) at one time. We know because we caught him just a few feet away from the chicken house with 9 "lumps" in him. We did kill him because they will always come back once they've enjoyed such an easy meal. We also suspected we were losing eggs too so we put some of those plastic Easter eggs in a few nests and strangly enough they disappeared and we haven't had much trouble since then.

-- Eve Lyn (evelynv@valuelinx.net), July 31, 2001.

We lived in VA for about 7 yrs. in that time we lived in the boonies so to speak. being new to VA we were well educated on slithery critters. We were told by folks that where there are balck snakes there would not be copperheads, well... i am here to say that thats not entirely accurate. We had both. My philosophy towards black snakes is if they leave well enough be then OK, but if they are dining on one of my animlas, etc then i have to do something.

-- Bernice (geminigoats@yahoo.com), July 31, 2001.

One drastic solution -- move to Alaska -- we don't have snakes here!

-- Mike Nuckols (nuckolsm@wildak.net), July 31, 2001.

Not sure that balck snakes will kill copperheads. BUT the king snake will,,,I have seen a king in action and watched him swallow the copperhead. Kings are black with white/yellow bands,,,never kill one of those as they actually prefer to fed on the "bad" snakes.

-- ddt (troubled@ ftci.net), July 31, 2001.

My parents have had problems with black snakes in there henhouse. They took an egg, blew it out, filled it with salt, sealed it with scotch tape (where the salt was poured in). The snake ate it, it died. I've never tried it, but it has worked for them. We generally don't bother the black snakes (UNLESS they get in our house, and that does happen occasionally). We have killed two copperheads this year, one by our duck pen and one in our hay barn--we've never had them near the house before. We have more rodents than usual this year, and I think that is attracting the snakes. Sharon

-- Sharon (spangenberg@hovac.com), July 31, 2001.

We just started raising chickens this year. We had a couple black snakes in our chicken coop this spring. One of them got a chick. We relocated them, hubby and I both like snakes and they were just doing their thing. We then did our thing which was to tighten up the old rickety coop, fixed the door, reattached some loose hardware cloth and lastly used that spray foam stuff to seal up the cracks that the snakes used to gain entrance. Now the chickens are too big for them to eat. That foam stuff also works great to seal out wasps and I do dearly hate paper wasps!

Susan

-- Susan Troxel DeWitt (smtroxel@socket.net), July 31, 2001.

I put used golf balls in the egg nest. Usually one trip from the black snake becomes his last trip. Anytime I see used golf balls at a yard sale/flea market I buy a few cheap.

-- Russell Hays (rhays@sstelco.com), August 01, 2001.

Susan, you have the right idea about prevention rather than cure. Making the coop snake proof makes sense. We too live in Virginia and have black snakes and copperheads in the area although I have never seen a copperhead on our property although we have had black snakes. We have even had several in the basement which has a garage entrance in it which makes it a little hard to keep them out. When we find them, hubby just takes a hoe or rake and moves them back outside. I believe having the black snakes has kept the copperheads away. We also keep our grounds clear of debris and rubbish and keep the grass mowed particularly around the buildings. While I am not a fan of snakes, I do try to let them live.

-- Colleen (pyramidgreatdanes@erols.com), August 01, 2001.

We have had blacksnakes on our family farm through several generations, and treat them as part of our farm family. They often grow to be 5 or 6 feet long. I've never seen one strike when handled -they're calm and friendly. Most old-time farmers know that they keep the poisonous snakes away (copperheads and cottonmouths), and keep the rat and mouse populations down. They may eat a few chicken eggs, but they are your friend; if you don't treat them as such, you may end up with less friendly predators. One of my ancestors was bitten by a cottonmouth that dropped out of a tree. And I once had to hop aside from a copperhead's path. I prefer the blacksnakes, thank you.

-- Gwen (ggiffen@1st.net), August 05, 2001.

I was having the same problem, my ducklings kept disappearing, one everynight. Finally I saw the snakes, ended up shooting four of them with the 22. Last year there was one here and i left it alone because they are supposed to be benefical, well I lost 5 ducklings because of it.

-- Ginger (majic99@home.com), August 06, 2001.