LANCASTER COUNTY, PA - The woman, who said she had never even held a snake before, scooped up the water snake as part of a sacking contest at the copperhead roundup at Muddy Run Recreation Park last August.
The snake sunk its tiny teeth into the woman’s hand. Surprised, she jumped, yelled and ran to a table where paramedics cleaned the tiny wound and gave her a Band-Aid.
The men at the event played with more machismo and higher stakes as they sacked 15 poisonous western diamondback rattlesnakes — imported from Oklahoma to get around a state ban in Pennsylvania on rattlesnake-sacking contests.
None of the men was bitten. That was good for them, but, let’s face it, the possibility of those venom-filled fangs sinking into a body part is what draws many people to snake roundups in the seven states where such events haven’t been outlawed.
Like a den of angry rattlers, the snake roundup at Muddy Run has stirred anew passions over whether such snake hunts are an anachronism that offer only morbid curiosity for humans and only harm to species of snakes declining in numbers.
Angry reaction or not, the organizers of the fledgling Susquehanna Valley Copperhead Club vow to hold another roundup in the area next year.
“The people who oppose these hunts would balk at a lightning bug-catching contest,” says David McFadden, a Philadelphia-area man who formed the club with family members and helps stage snake roundups around the state.
Roundups in Pennsylvania usually involve hunters scouring mountains for rattlesnakes, then bringing them into a central location to compete for prizes. By law, they must be released afterward.
The lively events also feature sacking contests of live rattlesnakes and other snakes. They are brought in from other states since native snakes by state law may not be used in sacking contests.
The hunts result in about three poisonous bites a year, McFadden says.
“These snakes just literally are not damaged in any way. We educate a lot of people about poisonous snakes. We think we have saved lives.”
But, concerned about declining snake populations, the Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission has proposed new regulations that would severely restrict such snake hunts statewide.
The regulations, currently undergoing a public comment period, would make roundups more expensive, raising permit fees for individual hunters and for the roundups themselves.
The number of rattlers that could be taken out of the wild for a roundup would be halved to one per hunter. Female rattlers would be off-limits altogether and the males that could be caught would have to be an above-average 42 inches long or more.
Hunting copperheads would be restricted to a six-week season in June and July, just like rattlers, restricting roundups like the one at Muddy Run built around copperheads.
And native species of snakes such as black snakes, garter snakes and water snakes would no longer be able to be used in sacking contests. The law would close the loophole of bringing in snakes raised outside Pennsylvania, notes Jeff Bridi, a regional PFBC official who helped draft the new regs.
However, rattlesnakes not native to Pennsylvania still could be used for sacking contests.
“Pennsylvania has a black eye for letting this go on,” says Jesse Rothacker, a Lititz herpetologist and founder of Lititz-based Forgotten Friend Reptile Sanctuary.
“What the Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission has done is make the perfect political compromise. I think it’s sort of their way of dissolving these things until something else can be done.”
Jack Hubley of Lititz, an avid herpetologist and host of TV’s “Wild Moments” program, can’t bear to watch sacking contests. “It teaches all the wrong lessons,” says Hubley, who owns a timber rattlesnake and was among about 30 people who met at the North Museum of Natural History and Science recently to plan a course of action against roundups.
“It’s very degrading to wildlife and shows them no respect at all. It reduces rattlesnakes to a number on the scoreboard and the significance of the snake is completely lost.”
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Rattlesnake roundups originated almost 100 years ago in the West where ranchers and townsfolk wanted to rid their communities of high numbers of snakes. They became annual events and big fund-raisers for communities.
There, the only good rattlesnake is a dead rattler ethos still rules. Burning gasoline and explosives are one method used in dens to flush the snakes. Rattlers are used in sacking contests, where contestants try to stuff as many in a sack in the least amount of time.
Afterward, the snakes are killed and shuttled off to a booth where they are skinned and eaten in stew.
Rattlesnake roundups also caught on in Pennsylvania, where the Pennsylvania Dutch long ago believed that milk snakes could suckle cows dry and hoop snakes could bite their tail and roll downhill and chase people.
Next to Texas, Pennsylvania has the most rattlesnake roundups — usually nine or 10. This was the 50th year for the one in Morris, in Tioga County.
They have become a part of the mountain personality and are tremendous fund-raisers for fire companies and small towns. The Cross Fork roundup in Potter County this summer netted more than $20,000 for the Kettle Creek Hose Company.
The early hunts were hell-raising affairs and the snakes were killed. The state outlawed the killing of rattlesnakes at roundups in the 1970s when the PFBC became responsible for managing and protecting the state’s amphibians and reptiles. Regulations on roundups and rattlesnake hunting have been tightened several times since then.
Timber rattlesnakes, a species being considered in Pennsylvania for endangered or threatened status, are on the decline in Pennsylvania, according to the PFBC.
Those who want to see snake roundups and sacking contests banned point to mounting evidence that rattlesnakes — and quite likely copperheads as well — do not survive unless returned almost precisely to the den sites from which they were captured.
The law requires that they be returned to where they were captured, but it is not policed. And since den sites are often in the most remote nooks and crannies of mountains, critics question how many snakes really do get hauled home over hill and dale after a contest.
Detractors also contend sacking contests injure snakes. All that grabbing and boot-pinning can’t help, nor can being hauled from one event to another.
Then there’s the issue of safety and those needless snake bites consuming expensive anti-venin kept at hospitals.
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Snake roundups in Pennsylvania are wholesome family entertainment and help dispel the very prejudice against snakes so sought by anti-roundup groups, says McFadden.
A former York County resident who hunted copperheads in the River Hills, McFadden says rattlesnake roundups staged by the Keystone Reptile Club he’s a member of go to great pains to see that the snakes are placed back under the very same log or rock they were captured from.
“We take a lot of care and precautions every step that we do,” says McFadden, noting that roundups and the snakes require careful documentation by the PFBC.
“We do it because we enjoy it. We do it to provide entertainment and education for the public. People want to be there.”
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All critics of snake roundups agree that it is essential to rally strong public support for the new PFBC regulations.
To view the proposed regulations, go to the PFBC’s Web site at
www.fish.state.pa.us. Comments will be accepted until Jan. 15 and may be made online at
www.state.pa.us/Fish/regcomments, or by writing to Executive Director, Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission, P.O. Box 67000, Harrisburg, PA, 17106.
Beyond the tightened rules, there is a lively discussion.
Hubley and others are hesitant to seek an end to snake roundups with their fund-raising ability and mountain community heritage. They would prefer to see them retrofitted and built around displaying of live snakes and education of their worth.
Frank Felbaum, former head of Pennsylvania’s Wild Resource and Conservation Fund, refers to snakes as “pest control from the dude upstairs.” He, too, would like to see snake roundups focus more on teaching about snakes than capturing them.
“We fail to make people love nature. If people love and understand nature, that turns into conservation,” he says.
But others are pushing for a legislative route for an outright ban on roundups.
Some think that’s unlikely. Declaring war on snake roundups is akin to an attack on the tradition of hunting.
“You’ve got to realize that you have a mom and apple pie issue here,” reasons Hubley. “These people have friends that count — legislators. I think this is an uphill battle.
“Timber rattlesnakes don’t have many friends,” adds Hubley who gives live snake educational shows. “People are fearful of them. When you get them out you can just feel it.
“I’d say most people wouldn’t miss them if they weren’t here.”
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