My educator neighbors have been transformed into hard core survivalists since moving out here. I was talking to the gun hating neighbor when shots rang out, so I excused myself and drove my lawn tractor over to the other neighbor's stable area where I heard the shots. I saw a huge garter snake, still alive, entangled in a pitch fork stuck in the ground. Then I saw the 20 ga shotgun sitting up on a feed box. The snake had two large lumps in it and then my neighbor, Steve came down from the house and said he got the snake out of the chicken coup with the pitchfork and shot at it with the shotgun. But most all the pellets missed, so I released the snake and whacked it with my machete. I told him that for snake killing, a machete was hard to beat. Funny, because I had just been telling the other neighbor that I would be thinning the varmints out, and not to worry if he heard an occasional gun shot. I love Spring. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />