Copperheads OH YEAH

[freewookie]

The Timber Rattler is the only snake that I know of in Texas that is protected but then I'm not looking for which snakes are protected. There were 9 copperhead snake bites in our county last year and there have been some more this year. Since my dog has learned the fine art of snake shaking and throwing, whenever she encounters a copperhead I run before she can throw it 30 feet in an unknown direction.

There's actually a season for rattlers in OK but like any species if it's threatening it doesn't matter. Wonder if I can use that same logic on deer eating the garden?

 

[WM75Guy]

You don't need to bring the snake to the ED to prove it bit you. In fact we discourage people bringing them to the ED. We will take your word you got bit.

 

[cre10]

You don't need to bring the snake to the ED to prove it bit you. In fact we discourage people bringing them to the ED. We will take your word you got bit.

Treatment is the same for all snake bites right? That's why you don't need to bring it?

 

[WM75Guy]

For copperhead, rattlesnakes, and cottonmouth bites we use Crofab antivenom which is the only one that is FDA approved for use in the USA. When and how much is based on the severity of symptoms. All cause tissue damage. Rattlesnakes also cause problems with the blood thinning so their bites tend to be worse. Antibiotics are usually not needed as most bites don't get infected.

Crofab is not used on coral snake bites as their venom is a neurotoxin. All of the USA made antivenom has expired and the Mexico made is not approved for use in the USA. Treatment is pretty much symptomatic. If you quit breathing you get intubated and put on a ventilator. It's a myth that coral snakes do not have fangs and have to chew to inject venom. Coral snakes do have fangs, they are just smaller than the pit vipers. They can bite and a scrape from a fang will cause envenomation.

This link is to the Miami-Dade Venom One unit list of antivenoms and what species they cover. Crofab is made using sheep instead of horses. There is very little incidence of allergic reaction like there was with the old horse serum.

http://www.miamidade.gov/fire/library/antivenom-species-covered.pdf

 

[FTG-05]

You don't need to bring the snake to the ED to prove it bit you. In fact we discourage people bringing them to the ED. We will take your word you got bit.

Ok, that might explain the reaction I got the last time I took a snake into the ER in a brown paper bag.....

 

[Gary Fowler]

I killed a good sized(18") copperhead yesterday. I was moving some gates so I could weedeat the grass growing up between them, got the gates moved and got the weedeater and low and behold there was that snake just laying right in the grass. I guess they don't scare easily, but the weedeater whipped him up pretty good. He never did attempt to run away like most snakes would. I have killed several small ones usually about the size of a big night crawler worm but this is the first adult I have seen.

 

[WM75Guy]

Ok, that might explain the reaction I got the last time I took a snake into the ER in a brown paper bag.....

Think of a snake's head as a loaded syringe. The fangs are needles and the venom sac is the plunger. Everyone wants to see and play with the dead snake and yes, some people bring in the live snake. One squeeze of the head and the venom comes out the end of the fang. Many incidents of envenomation happen by playing with a dead snake. The venom stays potent for years after the snake is dead.

 

[FTG-05]

Think of a snake's head as a loaded syringe. The fangs are needles and the venom sac is the plunger. Everyone wants to see and play with the dead snake and yes, some people bring in the live snake. One squeeze of the head and the venom comes out the end of the fang. Many incidents of envenomation happen by playing with a dead snake. The venom stays potent for years after the snake is dead.

Thanks for the tutorial, Debby Downer!




(Prolly shoulda put one of these in my first post.....)

 

[oosik]

Hmmm. Not a really nice thing to greet you any time of the day. Here in EA WA state there is one poisonous snake - Western Rattlesnake. The problem is the rattlesnake looks very similar to the gopher snake(called bull snake here) and many beneficial snakes get killed because of this. I've been very fortunate - lived here 32 years now, out in the country, and not yet seen a single rattler. See bull snakes and we have rubber boa's also. I think I would be scared spit-less if I found a patch of rattle snakes like that in my yard. A single snake, now & then, isn't bad at all.

I just checked and the Western Rattlesnake is not a protected species in WA state. Actually protected is broken down into threatened, sensitive & other and it not on any of those lists.

 

[FTG-05]

Hmmm. Not a really nice thing to greet you any time of the day. Here in EA WA state there is one poisonous snake - Western Rattlesnake. The problem is the rattlesnake looks very similar to the gopher snake(called bull snake here) and many beneficial snakes get killed because of this. I've been very fortunate - lived here 32 years now, out in the country, and not yet seen a single rattler. See bull snakes and we have rubber boa's also. I think I would be scared spit-less if I found a patch of rattle snakes like that in my yard. A single snake, now & then, isn't bad at all.

I just checked and the Western Rattlesnake is not a protected species in WA state. Actually protected is broken down into threatened, sensitive & other and it not on any of those lists.

Used to swim in Rattlesnake Lake in WWA all the time during the '80's. Good thing is: there are no rattlesnakes west of the Cascade Curtain. Go figure.