When hunting in any African country, be sure and check your blinds before jumping into them. This is a 15' Black Mamba.
Better yet, sent your guide or hunting partner into the blind first.
Quote from: acolobowhunter on January 23, 2023, 05:51:38 PM
Better yet, sent your guide or hunting partner into the blind first.
:scared: :biglaugh:
Yikes. I think that cures me of any desire to go to Africa!
I hunted Africa, it is on your mind when getting in blind, we saw a black snake go into some rocks
but not good enough look to know if Black Mamba, I did have a Leopard come to water 20 yds from blind right before dark. Not a good feeling waiting for them to come pick me up with just a piece of burlap for a door!
My wife and I hunted Africa in2001 and sat in a blind one day called the "leopard blind". Hunting was slow even though it warmed into the eighties that day and when the PH came into get us he chased the leopard off our blind. We never even heard it, don't know how long it was up there!
I have a video of a 22 foot python that watered at a water tank then came to the blind and rose up about 5 feet and climbed right over the blind . This happened about two weeks before I got there . My partner found a dead Mamba on the road and later seen one out side his blind he got the heck out . My guide also told me he was in a blind one day and he felt something wet on his face he look up and there was a spitting cobra in the grass roof its venom had just missed his eyes.
.
I've been hunting in Africa 4 times. I've seen 1 black mamba cross a road we were driving down, and one black and yellow snake that the PH said was poisonous at the lodge we were staying at. Not enough to keep me away. I'm headed back again this summer!!!!
Bisch
I saw one black mamba, about 9-10 feet long in a river bed. Saw one shed skin, and have no idea what kind it was. The mamba gave me nightmares. I don't do snakes very well.
Murray
:scared:
Die quick from a Mamba bite. Beats cancer or Parkinson's or ALS or . . .
At least I'd die hunting.
Of 5 trips over, I have seen only 1 snake depite countless hours in ground and elevated blinds. Remember that most Americans go over during our summer, which is their dry season and "winter". It can indeed get plenty cold in South Africa and Namibia in July.
That does not agree with snakes in general. I did have a single encounter with a snake. I am not inclined to kill snakes on sight, so that when a small one came slithering out of the long grass that was used to create the wall of the elevated blind that I was in, I took notice. It did not have the "typical" triangular head of a venomous snake so I watched it glide away back into the wall of grass never to be seen again. To this day I don't know if this was the right or wrong thing to do, as it was never addressed by the PH: just the other hunters who immediately said "did you kill it"?
Fried or baked?
On my last trip to Zimbabwe I saw a black mamba and two spitting cobra's. The cobra's were hanging dead on a pole in camp when we pulled into camp at 3:30 in the morning. They did not realize we would get in to camp before they could do something with the snakes. The PH tried not to tell us where they were killed but finally admitted they were killed near camp. Needless to say my Hillbilly buddies from WV did not sleep very well for several days. LOL. The PH told me that when we were out that the trackers would see a snack before we did because they were afraid of them. Not. walking down a trail one morning I tapped the tracker on the back with my bow. He was ahead of me. He stopped and looked back a me and I pointed out a snake In the trail ahead of him. He about knocked me down running over me. LOL The snaked appeared to be about 8 foot long. The PH told us to sit up next to a tree if we got bit. I asked him why and he said because it was easier for them to find the dead hunters. LOL
:scared:
Every summer, the newspapers and videos make it seem like you can find all the African snakes in southern Florida. It kinda makes our rattlesnakes and copperheads seem rather meek and mild.
Ha! Too funny :biglaugh:
That must be I have done most of my hunting in Michigan. We only have one poisonus snake and they are rare.
I've hunted several places thick with Diamondback Rattlesnakes and or copperheads. Wrangled many, killed a whole lot more. I really like snake boots for the cactus but they do allow you to be a little more aggressive with catching snakes. That said, really I've only had one close call where I was struck, well, unless I was stepping on the snake to hold it down for catch or kill. It never got fangs in me but my jeans were soaked in venom and it was tough on my shin. While snakes are hazards they would never keep me from enjoying hunting.
The outfitter had a dog killed by a Puff Adder. Lucky, we didn't see any snakes while we were there - during their winter.