This bad boy showed up on my neighbor's front porch yesterday. Biggest one I have ever seen. He was fat and had a really bad temper. I'll post second pic in a minute.

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That's a big fat bastar d! How many Chihuahuas were missing?

This is in Pearland. His back yard is on one of the Southwyck golf course lakes. This sucker was in his front yard though. Thing looks like it had its fair share of food.

Fattest one I ever seen!

You live in my neighborhood. You should state that it was found near the clubhouse where NNO will be held tomorrow night.

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This is in Pearland. His back yard is on one of the Southwyck golf course lakes. This sucker was in his front yard though. Thing looks like it had its fair share of food.

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THIS IS PEARLAND??? I grew up in Silverlake and have never seen a snake bigger than 6 inches

What is it, about as fat as a brick is wide?

It's a cottonmouth.

Yellow bellied water snake?

Edit- well wishful thinking that it's a water snake since I live in Pearland too! That thing is huge.

That is a pig of a cottonmouth! Can't say that I've seen one that fat before. He definitely would have died at my place too.

Good lord that's a big moccasin! Almost all snakes get a life pass from me, but I'm glad he's dead, there's no room in this world for aggressive *******s like that.

Not sure how to tell how fat that WM is. Using the shovel kind of distorts how big it really is.

Using the brick and the width of the shovel blade to help with perspective ......
Damn that's a big and thankfully DEAD fella!
I've seen a LOT of the mean ole bastar@s all over East Texas especially while picking mayhaws with my dad in the 60's when those sob's were getting active and damn aggressive ...and that one is as big as anything I can remember!
Those damn things truly scare the sheit outa me. I can handle damn near any snake and seldom kill any BUT I have a deep down freight of those and always kill em on sight!

I've come across several hundred cottonmouths in the wild and don't think they are aggressive. They will posture up and open their mouth, but I've never had one lunge, strike unprovoked, "chase," etc. Now if you hit it with a shovel, yeah, it'll get defensive. I don't know that their reputation is warranted, at least to the extreme exhibited here.

Depends on how you come across them in my experience. When you come up on one that you didn't see, they tend to get aggressive, mostly because they are just as startled as you are. All of the ones that I've been on top of before I realized it were good and pissed off.

I'm disappointed there was almost no real freaking out.

But, one lady who holds herself out to be a protector of all things in the animal kingdom and acts like she can ID every snake out there thought it was a hognose.

Of course she also thought this was a harmless water snake too.

Even from the back you can tell it by the head. Look at the shape. Viper shape for sure. Glad it's dead I might add.

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I'm disappointed there was almost no real freaking out.

But, one lady who holds herself out to be a protector of all things in the animal kingdom and acts like she can ID every snake out there thought it was a hognose.

Of course she also thought this was a harmless water snake too.

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What is that?

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I'm disappointed there was almost no real freaking out.

But, one lady who holds herself out to be a protector of all things in the animal kingdom and acts like she can ID every snake out there thought it was a hognose.

Of course she also thought this was a harmless water snake too.

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What is that?

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Same as OP

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I'm disappointed there was almost no real freaking out.

But, one lady who holds herself out to be a protector of all things in the animal kingdom and acts like she can ID every snake out there thought it was a hognose.

Of course she also thought this was a harmless water snake too.

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What is that?

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Same as OP

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A much younger version though.

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Depends on how you come across them in my experience. When you come up on one that you didn't see, they tend to get aggressive, mostly because they are just as startled as you are. All of the ones that I've been on top of before I realized it were good and pissed off.

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I guess that depends on your definition of aggressive. They may be "pissed off," but all they do is stand their ground, gape, and rattle their tail. They don't charge or confront, just stand their ground.

I've had one charge and rear up like a dad gum cobra on the banks of the San Bernard River.

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Depends on how you come across them in my experience. When you come up on one that you didn't see, they tend to get aggressive, mostly because they are just as startled as you are. All of the ones that I've been on top of before I realized it were good and pissed off.

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I guess that depends on your definition of aggressive. They may be "pissed off," but all they do is stand their ground, gape, and rattle their tail. They don't charge or confront, just stand their ground.

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I've had them come at me before. Not all the time, but more often than once.

Not a big fan of Orry but what he's stating in that is accurate.

I've tried multiple times to get them to "chase" me, hasn't happened. Only time I've gotten them to strike is when I was intentionally jacking with them.

Just standing their ground, hissing or showing their mouth I don't really consider aggressive.

I have told this story before but I will again. I have had one chase me. One night after college a buddy of mine and I were fishing a small stock pond that we grew up fishing and were going to spend the night out there drinking beer, fishing, and sleeping in the truck. We pulled a hay trailer down to the bottom because the pond was a little down and nobody had mowed all year. As you would expect in towards the end of summer the first 3 or 4 feet from the water line was just mud, so we pulled the trailer up parallel to that.

Now that I set the scene, I watched a cottonmouth swim from the darkness directly towards me. Obviously freaking me out, I jumped up on the hay trailer, looked back, and that snake was in my boot prints from where I had been standing. After moving off he did it again a couple of times before I took a swipe at him with a 2 iron. I missed.

I shot him the next morning with a 20 gauge. Stood in the same spot and he was there in less than a minute. One of the craziest things I have seen in the wild.

Strangely on that same night we pulled the biggest bass I have ever seen out of that water on the first cast. LIttle pond that hadnt been fished, occasionally gets flooded out by a creek, and has more than once almost dried up, grew some giants in the ten years between high school and that night.

Part of the issue is they are a curious snake.

They are one of the laziest snakes around. Most people get chased by the much meaner diamond back water snake and think it is a moccasin. That is much more common.

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I've tried multiple times to get them to "chase" me, hasn't happened. Only time I've gotten them to strike is when I was intentionally jacking with them.

Just standing their ground, hissing or showing their mouth I don't really consider aggressive.

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Agree.

They are very defensive, but it is virtually always a big show. They cannot afford to waste venom. I find it entertaining to watch. Most people that have a run in with an aggressive "cottonmouth" are harrassing it making it defensive, or are mistaking an ornery water snake for a cottonmouth, or are in the water, where the snake is just swimming towards a "big floating object" to investigate or rest on from its perspective.