Pistol and Rattler

One day I came home, and as soon as I got out of the truck, I heard dogs yapping hysterically and the ominous buzz of an angry, coiled rattlesnake. I grabbed my Ruger Mark-IV .22 calibre target pistol from the truck and hurried toward the deadly chaos. As I rounded the far end of the house, I saw a very large rattlesnake up against the side of the house. His head was out and only inches from the face of the alpha male, Tanner, a big, yellow lab. Tanner has gone on to the celestial hunting grounds since then due to heart disease (We put him down when he began to suffer trying to get oxygen), but he was the perfect boss dog because of his laid-back nature. As I found out later, three dogs had already been struck by the rattler. They were our alpha female, our natural alpha male who could not take the leadership position becaue he had been injured by a truck up at the paved road, and a yellow lab who was the inquisitive thinker of the pack. But Tanner was now in imminent danger of being the fourth dog to be struck. The snake was about twenty feet away, with the back of his head toward me. I knew if I hit him in the back of the head though, the little bullet would zip through and hit Tanner in the face. I quickly aimed at the tail of the snake and fired. The shot was true and it disabled him so he was anchored and could not strike Tanner. I hurried over and finished him with a head shot and then quickly checked the dogs. I found the three dogs bleeding from bites on their faces, throats, and chests. As calmly as I could, not wanting to excite them any more as that would just cause the heart rate to increase and the deadly toxin to spread more quickly, I put them into the back of the pickup and drove to the vet's. On the way, I called Tasha, and she left work immediately. She called the vet's to tell them I was on the way with three snakebitten labs. I got there so quickly the dogs were not yet swelling from the poison. The dogs and I were immediately ushered into an examining room, and Dr. Dutch, the best vet I have ever had, came in. Because of the lack of swelling, Dr. Dutch asked, "Are you sure it was a poisonous snake?" I assured him it was. Just then, Tasha came in. I needed to go back home and see if the snake had bitten anyone else, just to be safe. I told Tasha, "Don't let Dr. Dutch dismiss this. They're going to be swelling up and needing antivenin in a couple of minutes!"
With that, I roared back to the property to make sure no one else was hit. I put the big timber rattler into a feed bag and hurried back to the vet's. I found Dr. Dutch shooting the dogs with antivenin as they had started to swell soon after I left. I dramatically dumped the snake on the floor by his feet, but Dr. Dutch was a veteran and never flinched. He remarked that it was indeed a very big rattler and continued working with the labs. The labs were now very quiet and in pain.
All three pulled through, and it was a $2,100 bill. I just read that it now costs about $2,000 a dog for a snakebite.