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Originally Posted by migol24
Are there really snakes in this part of town? I've never heard of snakes in Austin. How dangerous can they be?
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Yes Migol24, there are snakes in the entire chain of lakes, from harmless, to venomous, flesh destroying cottonmouths and moccasins. There have also been some sightings of pythons, though few and rare, they were probably pets that were released along the lake. The Dept. of Fish and Wildlife have some records of sightings and captures in Town Lake, (LBL). The majority are harmless water snakes. You can tell the venomous ones from the non venomous by the size and shape of the heads. The venomous ones have big blocky heads with a narrow neck attached to a thick body and short tail. The non venomous ones have a long narrow body, tail and head and no discernable neck. If you are in the water and see a snake, when in doubt, just get out.
l've personally seen tons of water snakes in Lake Travis around old boat docks, and large semi submerged logs. We were fishing an old dock and were literally swarmed by dozens of docile water snakes. They are surface swimmers and take cover where they can find it. Blue herons love to eat them. But they need to get out of the water and warm themselves in the sun to raise their body temperature especially after eating to aid with digestion. The boardwalk may actually be too tall to give them that cover, but it may give us a vantage point to spot them along the shoreline. Look around Elephant ear groves, rocks, and fallen branches. They are pit vipers that hunt mostly at night by sensing temperature variations, so look for a log in a sunny spot where they might be sunning after a midnight meal.
There are also eels in LBL which can resemble water snakes when they swim close to the surface.
The venemous snakes are not dangerous unless you provoke them....they don't want to waste their venum on something too large to eat. The most dangerous and scarey thing in LBL is the garbage and debris hidden under the surface of the water.
Just another fun fact about our venemous water snakes, their venum contains hemotoxins, (attacks red blood cells causing tissue damage and bleed out) not neurotoxins (attacks the nervous system and causes paralysis) like rattlesnakes, cobras...which means you are far less likely to die if you get bit by one. But small prey they feed on, birds, frogs, fish would die quickly as they bleed out internally from the anticoagulants in the venum. Hope this answers your question, sorry I didn't get into much detail...my snake expertise is with constrictors like boas, ball and burmese pythons.
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