ndwoods:

You wrote:
> Beyond me why someone would try and pick one up.

Ignorance. I was up in the Catskills a few years ago - Mt. Wittenberg - and the teenager in front of me saw a snake ... if I hadn't yelled at him he would have picked it up ... a 2-footer could be a garter snake or a young rattler, but the kid didn't have a clue. I came up FAST and we noted the pattern, and later determined it was a garter snake. But if I hadn't yelled and it had been a timber rattler, it could have gone differently.

BTW, local ring-necked snakes are so tame they can be put into a shirt pocket and taken for a walk. So snake identification is kinda important.