Snakes arent angry, dont attack people, and to my knowledge dont have the ability to ask questions, be it first or even later.
cottonmouths have a reputation as being aggressive snakes. However, in tests designed to measure the suite of behavioral responses by free-ranging cottonmouths to encounters with humans, 51 percent of the test subjects tried to escape and 78 percent used threat displays or other defensive tactics. Only when the snakes were picked up with a mechanical hand were they likely to bite. [9]
First off have you ever dealt with these snakes on a day to day basis? I do. Any day I may run into them. My house is on a 13 acre bass pond that leads to wetlands. Cottonmouths aren't a problem for an adult who is watching what they're do. That's the problem. One day I flipped over a kayak and there was a 6 footer under it. I'm right over the snake and he's surprised. I jump, he jumps and there we are. Let's say I was looking somewhere else or talking to someone. Most likely I would have been bitten. You can say he's just defending himself by getting into attack position but he still wants to get me if he can. I have a big rat snake that I run into once in a while and he simply heads in the other direction as soon as he see me. I'm fine with him, he kills things I don't need around.
It's like alligators, I don't think they're very dangerous because I know what to look for. On the hand we've had two people killed by alligators this year, close by. There again you do the wrong thing and you may be dead. Hate to say I'm pro people. I also have small childern and there clueless. That scares me. I have two dogs I send out with the kids and an outdoor cat that's job is to kill snakes. The dogs will find animals long before the kids will and the cat is good at copperhead removal.
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