snakes in my yard!

so a couple weeks ago i had a graduation party for my small group girls at my home. the girls and their little brothers went swimming. one of the boys noticed a "super wiggly worm" in the pool. i looked at and realized it was a baby snake. i got the skimmer and fished it out. i'd thought it was a rattlesnake, but wasn't a 100% sure. one of the dads didn't think it was a rattler so we chucked the little thing into the canyon area across the road. these are pix of the little guy in the skimmer basket.

today, i'm pretty sure it was a rattler and we found him momma. when i went outside this morning, my friends who are housesitting next door told me that their little guy who is 2 and his grandpa were met by a huge rattler on their way to the pergola which sits to the end of my house at the end of a square that has 4 little box gardens. they were trying to figure out where the snake had gone when i came out. i walked around the area carefully and didn't see or hear any sign of it. i got a shovel and a hoe out of the shed just in case and went to cleaning up after the party we had last night. dave (housesitting next door) & i started down the path to put up an extra table when he said snake. sure enough there it was about 8 feet ahead of him, a big rattler who was making a meal of a squirrel. this pic is of the snake waiting for his venom to paralyze the squirrel. we were deciding it was going to be super gross to kill the thing mid meal with shovel or hoe when the gardner showed up. woohoo for the gardner who wasn't grossed out enough to not kill it mid meal. and yeah for him disposing of the remains of the snake and the squirrel.

and i have to say, i'm still queasy. i may be all day. watching a snake kill something on tv is gross, but seeing it happen 6 ft from you is so unbelievably disgusting. i know the whole circle of life and nature's way, etc., but it's still just really gross!