Meet The Neighbors: Snake Season Puts Reptiles, Residents In Close Quarters
LAS CRUCES — 'Tis the season for rattlesnakes, so watch where you step!
By Dolores M. Bernal Sun-News reporter
Rattlesnakes are breeding this year, said Roy Thibodeau of Reptile Rescue in Las Cruces. Rattlesnakes only breed every two to four years and usually keep to themselves. But with their pursuit of a mate, coupled with continuing subdivision development and the ongoing drought, the dangerous — but fascinating — reptiles are slithering into the city in greater numbers.
Thibodeau has been responding to an average of 30 calls a week from people in Las Cruces who have encountered the reptiles in their homes or on their properties. "
They're very social at this time. The males are looking for females and vice versa. They don't care where they can go to look for the females," said Thibodeau. "
They only have one thing on their minds and they can get very aggressive."
Female rattlesnakes, on the other hand, are very "
cranky" because, as Thibodeau puts it, "
they need to drop a litter of babies." Thibodeau said that rattlesnake bites are painful but rarely fatal. An encounter, however, can be scary. Just ask Marty and Rob Blasche of Las Cruces.
The Blasches recently discovered that a rattlesnake was becoming very comfortable living under a large cow tongue cactus in the backyard of their Picacho Hills home. "
My cats were very conscious of the snake being there," said Rob Blasche. Thibodeau showed up with his professional snake-picker-upper equipment and placed the diamondback rattlesnake in a container so that it could be released back into the wild — which is not too far away from the Blasches' home.
"
The open desert is behind our house," said Marty Blasche. "
We love the wildlife." Rattlesnakes and other type of snakes are frequent visitors to people living in the Talavera area, east of the city, according to Thibodeau. Coincidentally, that's where a lot of development also is taking place. "
The snakes are losing their habitat and is harder for them to find rodents that carry disease and make people sick," he said. "
(The snake encounters) are not going to stop as development continues or until they're all killed."
The Blasches said that they understand that their home has gotten in the way of the snakes and not vice versa and that finding that balance between human and animal habitat can be very difficult. "
We're displacing wildlife just by building a house," said Marty Blasche. "With the drought, food becomes scarce and they know that where there are people, there are rodents. It's tough."
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