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long term effects of hognose venom

V

vandrad9

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I have a western hognose and ive been browsing threw the intrenet and have read alike 10 to 15 accounts of a hognose biting and causing serious inflamation. most apparently were due to a feeding response, some we in defence, theres one guy that said his hognose trikes with an open mouth and i belive him cause mine hase done the same in his enclosure, but there is another case of someone holding his hognose after just getting out of the shower and the hog bit him. the fact is even though they rarely bite it is impossible to predict 100% when they are going to stike if they ever do. and it can only take one time to cause some damage. People say you have to let them chew on you well there is one case where the hog let go immediatly and otheres that just lasted 5-10 sec and their whol arms swole.
Now what i'm worried about is long term damage. there is one case where a guy got bit and his lymphnodes swoll up along with his arm and the hos was only on fow no more than 10 sec. Lymphnodes are a part of the immun system. now ten yrs later the guy has pemenent immune system mal function. there is no hard evidence that it was the hog bite that did this, but there are two other cases. One girl got bit 17 yrs befor she posted and sayed her lymph nodes were swolen. Another guy got bit by an eastern hognose and after his bite healed his body still had trouble healing from small cuts and when he went to the doctor turned out he had a high white blood cell count just like the first guy i mentioned which in case anyone doesnt know if your white blood cells go into overdrive you can get sick real easy and the flu can get bad. Ive read long term effects of rattlesnake bites and they range from speech imparment, to artheritis, to heart problems. So a little permanent immune damage sounds likely
all of these post that ive read were years ago enough time to get your blood tested. has anybody suffered any long term effects from a hognose bite?( sorry for the Spelling)
 
Let me refraze that question because I know there's gonna be people saying they didn't get a reaction cause theyre not allergic but I think Dr Bryan Fry has made it clear that they are venomous. Seriously this is important. Has anyone suffered long term effects from hognose envenomation?
 
Wow I have never heard all those stories before. I have heard of a couple people being idiots while feeding, but no defense bites. You said yours will strike with an open mouth? They are known for closed mouth strikes, but open mouth is pretty rare. Didn't you just make a thread about possibly getting one...you already found and got one?

If so the odds to get bitten are low. Hognoses are a very popular snake these days and you have only found 15 "stories". I don't think you realize how low those odds are to be bit and then have a serious reaction. If you feed it without being stupid you can rest easy knowing you will almost surely never get bitten. Seems like all this snake will bring you is worry at this point.
 
MrTPlush said:
Wow I have never heard all those stories before. I have heard of a couple people being idiots while feeding, but no defense bites. You said yours will strike with an open mouth? They are known for closed mouth strikes, but open mouth is pretty rare. Didn't you just make a thread about possibly getting one...you already found and got one?

If so the odds to get bitten are low. Hognoses are a very popular snake these days and you have only found 15 "stories". I don't think you realize how low those odds are to be bit and then have a serious reaction. If you feed it without being stupid you can rest easy knowing you will almost surely never get bitten. Seems like all this snake will bring you is worry at this point.
Click to expand...

Hey mrtplush, you're right. I emailed dr Bryan fry (an expert on venom) yesterday about my concerns and he said " they are of only trivial human medical importance."
 
Can you post links to that information you found concerning effects from hognose bites?
 
Yes give me like 2 hours. Oh and mr. t plush yeah I got a good about a week ago. Been doing a ton of research to see what precautions to take to not get bitten. But eventually I think Nietzsche is gonna wanna see what I taste like and I'm cool with my whole arm swelling up, I just didn't want no prolonged bone, joint, immune stem degeneration and what Dr.Fry said about them them being only of trivial human medical importance is good enough to for me to keep mine. Cause seriously if a lot of you guys would have come at me with some horror stories I was ready to give him up
 
I had gathered all the links and when I wanted to post them it said I wasnt logged in and I lost it all. I'm gonna need another day or too I'm too mad to do it again right now
 
What I do in cases like that is to cut and paste all the links into a notepad file just in case something like that happens. Wouldn't be the first time that I lost a post on a message board site.....
 
I've been bit by hogs at least a half dozen times, some short bites and others that hung on for a bit. The most I got was some minor swelling and itching/irritation. They're completely harmless IMO.

Sure, if they hit you just right you can get some venom, but it's not considered dangerous. I'm sure there are cases that went horribly wrong, just like I'm sure if you looked hard enough you could find cases where ball python bites left teeth in and got horribly infected. I'd be more worried about a dog bite than a hognose bite.
 
Thanks for that MCMB-2. Yes I've also read on discussion forums that a lot of people have very little effect. They say those are the dry bites, but the dry bites seem to out weigh the wet ones by a lot which leads me to believe that all these non reaction bites can't ask be dry bites. The reaction from the venom if you get it off quick must not be that bad.
 
Judging by what you posted, it sounds like an immune response to the venom, not a reaction to the venom.

Immune responses to venom are very rare. But they do happen. Takes bee for example. I swell up like a balloon while others just don't react. The immune response to the venom is worst then anything that the venom can do.

Now the thing about allergies.

If you get bit 3000 times by a hognose, you may only swell 3 times. You may only have a allergic reaction two of those times. It may do some serous damage. But that does apply to anything you do in the day. You may become allergic to your cat licking you. Your dog. You may become allergic to bowl of oatmeal you have eaten every morning since your child hood.

The venom itself is of no medical significance, but give it to a body that is willing and able to over react, and you can get a problem.

But if you are going to say that you can get an reaction from a hognose bite therefor they are dangerous. You have to give up pretty much everything. Some people are allergic to their own bodies. No cats, no dogs, no food...the list is endless.

No, hognose are not dangerous by themselves. But can with a willing immune system, do some real damage. But it is the immune system, not the hognose doing the damage.

Here is what you need to know. If you get bit, see what happens. If it starts to un reasonably swell up seek medical attention. With proper medical attention chances of long term damage is zero.

I got my first hognose a month ago. She bit me right away. The hit my pink, chewed on it for a few second, realized that it was not food and spit it out. Cute little teeth marks couple drops of blood. Zero reaction.

If I get bit again, I will see what happens. If it looks like it is going to get a bad reaction, I will seek medical attention.

In my opinion, hog nose are safer to keep then dogs and cats.
 
I have been bitten by his several times, from quick grab and release, to letting one chew for a few seconds. I have had them tear up a finger quite a bit and I have NEVER had a reaction, no swelling, and no 'sickness' or long term effects. I believe it is more of an antifilactic type reaction than a 'true venom'. For one, if it is an actual venom, the delivery system is very poor and not effective. I have also kept rear fanged venomous snakes like bioga(mangrove snakes), and lots of front fanged venomous snakes, and I assure you all...hog nose snakes are nowhere near the 'venomous snakes' as any it the 'real' venomous snakes.
 
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