Snake shot

Thanks im a LEO in Oklahoma County and sometimes we get the "I have a snake in my house" call. My duty gun is a 21c so I cant shoot snake shoot through it. And I just recently purchased the 642 for a back-up/car door gun/off duty.
 
I do the job across the river in Gods country ;) I've always kept a #9 or 2 in my car for skunks and such. I've killed many copperheads by engaging in H2H on the road at dusk. My prefered weapon is a 26" ASP or a side handle baton. Of course with the size of the rattlers you have I might want something longer! Even a .38 with #9 will tear up a house. I'd definitely run that one by a supervisor before unloading inside a residencde. Good luck.
 
I've found .38 CCI shot loads out of a snub to be pretty "iffy" on copperheads much beyond about 6'.

.45 ACP loads out of my Glock 36 though put out pretty awesome little pattern out to about 12'.

Used .38 shot load one-handed out of Smith 340 to finish off a wounded quail last month. Right ear rang for about an hour. :eek:
 
Birdshot loads are pretty hard on floors, I shot a rattler in my house with a 44 birdshot. It was the sub-floor, not the finished floor fortunately.

I've shot several rattle snakes with the CCI 38 birdshot loads in a 2" gun. I think I was within 6 to 8 feet at most, and they were instant dead, folded up. (They still moved, but they were not at all organised about it, they will move for an hour or more even with the head cut off)

Just be advised that snakes CAN still bite you, even the head alone after being cut off, for up to a couple of hours after being "dead". I ALWAYS cut the head off imediately by stepping on the head and cutting it off, then pick the head up with a shovel or pliers so as not to touch it, and bury it in a safe place where the dogs wont find it and dig it up. A sealed jar put in the trash would be OK too. Handling the body with the head on can easily get you bit, they will turn around and strike you even with the head cut off.

Don't EVER "play around" with a snake or snake head, even if "dead".
 
Chiming in from diamondback country (Az) -- .38/357 shot pretty effective up to 7 maybe8 feet or so if direct head hit, distance beyond that it may just wound so i take one step closer after the first shot and finish the head off if it isn't already smithereens. I want them dead-dead and so, if inside worry about the floor later :) - but hear you! I also have a .44 Sp/Mag that's effective up to about 11-12 feet with snakeshot with one shot. Ditto re the person posting about disposing of the head/body afterwards = very carefully.
 
Speaking of the CCI snake shot rounds, it seems like I heard somewhere that barrel length is critical to the proper functioning of them. I heard that the .38's work ok out of snubbies, but from longer barrels (like out of my 4" .357) the extra spin makes the shot pattern donut shaped, sparse in the center. Does anyone have any first hand knowledge on this?
 
Are the shotshells hard on the barrel? It seems like throwing a bunch of shot through a rifled barrel would cause damage. Any thoughts?
 
I live in a rural enviornment where snakes abound. I usually don't kill them unless they are making a pest of themselves. I just usually just relocate them, unless they are agressive, then I rehibilitate them with a 2 inch Smith kloaded with Snake Shot. Makes them "Good Snakes". Never had any problem with Snake Shot hurting the barrel and I've been shooting it since the 50s.

Jungle Work
 
Spencer:

From what I understand, you don't have to worry about your barrel. The plastic shot container protects the barrel, the shot never touches it. Apparently the plastic breaks apart right as it leaves the barrel, or so I heard.
 
I make .45acp shotgun shells by trimming any .30-06 base case of to 1.55", drilling the primer flash hole out to twice the factory[ if you do not, the primers will back out and lock up the cylinder] ,prime, add 3 gr universal. a 1/8" fiber wad. 115gr #8 shot and a poster board overshot card with a drop of parrafin[ just old Gulf wax] on the card wad to keep it in place.
Really does nicely in my 1917 S&W, used in full moon clips.
Don :)
 
I've used CCI shotshells...(38s)

they work...expensive, but they work.

Friends of mine go prairie dog hunting each summer/fall and nuke about a dozen each. They have walked right into what seemed like a snake pit.

they went through 20 rounds each that day of shotshell and slugs...

They loaded every other round with snake shot and used soft 125gr 38s in their 357s. (4" model 19s that got from police trade-ins) Never had problems with their barrels nor with the snakes.

First round should kill/incapacitate the wiggly suckers. Second shot with a slug will take the heads off.

-W
 
Well, I can tell you, I bought a 45 Colt Taurus revolver specifically to shoot snakes with up at my deer camp this summer (we tore down the old cabin and put up a new one, which involved messing with the old stone foundation, a.k.a. snake nest).

A 45 colt with a 2" barrel might not be good for much, but loaded with CCI shot, it is a mighty snake killer. Really, with the 45 you only have to point it in the general direction of the snake, and BAM what once was a snake becomes a slightly pink tinged mist.
 
Thanks im a LEO in Oklahoma County and sometimes we get the "I have a snake in my house" call.
Click to expand...
Have I mentioned recently that besides not being the type that does "authority" well:
(me as a cop after pulling over somone that passed on a blind curve - "Sir please exit the vehicle".
crosser of double yellow lines, "Don't you want to see my licence?"
me, "No sir, just leave your wallet on the front seat and walk over here. I'm not going to ticket you, I going to beat you to death. I've deemed you too stupid to live")
That I wouldn't have you guy's job for all the tea in China? Rotten pay and rotten hours are bad enough,,,but snakes.....yuk!

Anyhow, snake shot is good to 6 to 10 feet, depending on the particular gun used. My little Davies .22 Derringer with the (as The Blues Man calls it) subtle rifiling ;), is good out to about 10 feet. The land and groove (yes - singular) don't impart much spin. It patterns and shoots "harder" and "farther" than using shot shelles out of my 8 3/8 in barreled S/A .44mag.
The 2 biggest problems I see with using shot inside someones house:
1.) The amount of collateral damage it could do.
2.) The fallout over the colateral damage.
The little "fly droppings" the .22 throws probably won't penetrate something hard like a water line. I wouldn't trust the heavier shot of the centerfires to not do it unless I tested it real well. We had a guy put in a new kitchen for use a couple years ago. He drilled into a water line when he was hanging one of the cabinets. In the time it took him to run down in the basement and turn off the water, it did several hundred dollars worth of damage.

Snakes - yuk. Whatta nightmare situation. (Glad it's you and not me ;))

BTW, next cop I see eating lunch is going to have his tab picked up...
kind of a way of saying "thanks"...snakes -yuk!
 
"Snake loads" on small game?

Thanks to the guys with info on handloading snake loads.

Cheaper always works for me.

How would snake loads work for small game at close range? Reason I ask- when I'm out hog hunting there are times when I walk up on flocks of quail on the ground.

Every time I go small game hunting I can't find a thing, but when I'm hunting deer or pig those danged quail will let me get within 10 feet of them. If snake loads will work out of a 2" 357, I can carry my snub in my pocket and pick up a few quail on a slow day.
 
It seems to me that a slow day for big game will stay that way if you shoot a quail with a revolver. If it is slow, then it is slow; however, anyone that has hunted anything knows that game show up at the most unexpected times. I can imagine how foolish I would feel after shooting a small bird with a side arm, only to look up and see my trophy prance off...

I do see an application for this in upland hunting. I was hunting wild pheasant (none of this farm stuff) in Western Kanses a few months ago & walked up on a rooster that wouldn't get up. I could see his tail feathers in the brush, but he wouldn't move. I yelled, stomped, and did everything but kick him before he finally decided to get going. He was a good candidate for a side arm.

I guess that poses a good question: what does more damage at 10 yards, 16 gauge 5-shot or .44 snake shot? I like to have something left to eat...
 
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