I have kept snakes for well over 35 years, and from when I was a kid keeping them up until the present many non-snake people have told me how brave I am to hold a snake. I usually go along with the ego boost, therefor little do they suspect that I am a real wus when it comes to being bitten by a snake - just about any snake. My last bite of any merit was a Rainbow Boa at a local show about a year or so ago. A guy I knew wanted me to try to sell it for him and I agreed. As I pulled it out of the sack it was in, I asked that ever so ridiculous question: "Does it bite?" No sooner had the friend answered me: Nope, never has bitten" than the snake launched itself forward like that 5,000 mile per hour jet (of a few days ago) and struck me in the left forearm twice. Nice bleeders, but little if any pain. What surprised me was my reaction, or should I say lack of it. I calmly removed the snake and put it away in a display box. Of course, I almost swooned, but I hid that pretty well.
You may think that my calm actions would be the normal course of action for the big brave snake handler - but it was far from normal for me. Usually when a snake bites me, even when it is a neonate corn snake, I jerk back in sheer terror trying to avoid being bitten and scream "Aaaaahhhhh" or something to that effect. Many times over the years I have been too darned slow and the snakes got me. Other times though, and this has been due to lots of snakes trying to chomp down on me like I was a tasty mousicle, I manage with speed faster than a speeding bullet to jerk away just in the nick of time. The thing is though that when I do that, I do it in a motion more powerful than a locomotive. When you combine faster than a speeding bullet with more powerful than a locomotive you don't necessarily wind up with superman - especially when you add scared s--tless to that equation. What I do often wind up with is the scraped elbow as it rakes backwards across a tank top (those inside aquarium edges are a fine place to peel of a few layers of elbow grease and elbow skin). I once had about a 6 to 8 inch long, 2 to 3 inch wide scrape through several layers of skin avoiding a Gopher Snake bite. The thing is the bite would have been much less painful or damaging. Sometimes I smash backwards into the wall that I forgot was there. Or other times I have jumped backwards so fast as to lose my footing and land unceremoniously on my duff. Worse still is when the dogs are watching and I land atop one or two of them and the snake gets away because it fell to the floor in the mass of mammalian bodies. That can cause some pandemonium and embarrassment if anyone else is watching; heck it is bad enough in front of just the dogs!
I once pulled back so fast and hard - with the snake attached to my index finger mind you - that the snake flew about 15 feet across the room. Yes that was with a vicious baby corn snake all of less than a week old. I guess that is the worst thing, when I loose it when a baby snake bites me. I have this absolute, I am a big sissy boy, aversion to being bitten by a snake, any snake. I have tried to control it, and last year's bite by the Rainbow Boa showed some control, but maybe only because it came so unexpectedly. Then again I have watched in rather morbid fascination as a Northern Water Snake or three has chewed on my hand or fingers drawing lots of blood. My son has seen me do it many times to - that is scream or pull back and scream, or scrape myself etc, not act brave while a snake chews at will... We were in upstate NY once, walking along a river under a water fall when he spotted a Northern Water Snake. Once I had ID'd the snake, I told him to go for it. He made a few grabs, finally listened that he had to grab forward of where he wanted to get the snake, and then came up with one heck of a pissed off, nasty, and biting mass of coils. This was a pretty good sized one too, about 3 1/2 feet as I recall. It bit once or twice and then bit and chewed. I could see the panic in Brendan's face, and anticipating his next move (because I saw him tensing to do so) I immediately yelled out "Don't pull it off, let it chew it'll be better that way and hurt less". At that moment I saw a look of total bewilderment come across his face, and in a moment another look, that of doubtful trust. Yet another moment later I saw that all was well and Brendan was smiling as the Northern chewed away for a couple of seconds. I then told him to gently push his finger into the mouth a bit more - again that perplexed look - but he did it and the snake's mouth opened. I then had him push the head forward with his other hand, shimmying side to side a bit to unlock all the teeth and he was free. After that we both admired his catch before he released it. Then, and more importantly, we admired his war wounds. He now looked pretty proud of himself and seemed pretty confident that a snakebite from a nonvenomous snake that size was no big deal if on his hand anyhow. I, of course, was quite happy to see him overcome my ridiculous fear. It is always nice to see the young ones growing up better than yourself.
Mostly recently I have avoided bites by a female Western Hognose that I have. Brendan and I are afraid of that after seeing a picture spread of the effects of a Hognose bite. She is nasty until picked up and repeatedly strikes. I really do not want to find out if a quick bite and release from a hognose is enough to envenomate or not, so I continue my slapstick antics of pull back and scrape or pull back and smash.
As to the number of bites. Well it has got to be up there, at least 100 maybe more; or should I say attempted bites, as many wound up as bashes or scrapes instead of bites. Still, many have connected. With all that said, you would think I would never handle a venomous snake, but I have caught Mojave, Western Diamondback, Pygmy, and other types of rattlers. I was very careful when I handled them, and kept hands on to a minimum. Of course when I am bitten at home by one of my snakes, it is due to sheer carelessness. I am quite careful with large nonvenomous snakes as I am with any venomous snake - and by quite careful I mean extremely careful. There are no Steve Irwin antics for me while catching hots.
If anyone is interested, there is a GREAT book out there called the Snakebite Survivor's Club. It is available at Barnes & Noble. It is an account of one man's attempt to overcome his fear of snakes by visiting 4 or 5 continents and checking on survivors of venomous snakebite while doing so. He is a travel writer, if I recall correctly, and wrote this one very well. I think the author's name is Jeremy Seal. A truly fun read.
Oh well, time to head to work.
All the best,
Glenn B
