The Great Rattlesnake Hunt of Tieton
After clearing over a hundred snakes from a hillside near Tieton, a local man vows to use poison gas to finish off the den.
One hundred and twenty rattlesnakes were killed recently on a rocky hillside near Tieton by Harry Conrey of Yakima. The reptiles had left their den to sun themselves. Conrey says that he means to get those that escaped by using poison gas to drive them out of their hole. He has the rattles and three human witnesses to testify to the truth of his story.
“Conrey says that he means to get those that escaped by using poison gas to drive them out of their hole.”
While rattlesnake populations in the Yakima Valley have faced pressure from habitat loss and development, the 'denning' behavior remains a reality of local ecology. Conrey's use of chemical intervention in 1924 highlights an era of environmental management that often favored direct, aggressive elimination over today's more balanced conservation strategies.
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