# Snake Bite.



## Vol (Jul 5, 2009)

They are moving more than normal now.....looking for overwinter sites.

Regards, Mike

https://www.agweb.com/article/poisoned-pain-snakebites-always-a-farm-danger-naa-chris-bennett/


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## rjmoses (Apr 4, 2010)

"Shorts and tennis shoes"!!!!!

I don't even go out into the yard in shorts and tennis shoes! I always wear high top leather western boots. I guess growing up around copper heads, cottonmouths, etc., just made me super cautious.

Ralph


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## Teslan (Aug 20, 2011)

I'm curious. How many poisonous snakes do you guys see a year? I've only seen one rattlesnake in my whole life around the farm. I see bull snakes and garter snakes all the time.


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## rjmoses (Apr 4, 2010)

I see 3-4 a year, which means there's probably 20-30 in the area--copperheads and cottonmouths. Being between the rivers, I can spot water mocassions anytime I go to the river or even by my pond.

Ralph


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## haybaler101 (Nov 30, 2008)

The only snake I ever want to see are the pythons that my boots are made of. Supposed to be water moccasins, cottonmouth, and some rattlers here but all I ever see are black and garter snakes. I started up an old grain truck a few years ago and as I was driving it out of the shed, a big black snake slithered down out of the dash. I exited out the drivers door and he went out the hole in the passenger floorboard and the truck just kept on going.


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## somedevildawg (Jun 20, 2011)

Happened up on Mr. No shoulders yesterday going to the mailbox ....hate to kill em but this one had to go! I see 4-5 a year....most definately on the move now


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## paoutdoorsman (Apr 23, 2016)

What kind of snake is that dawg. I've never seen one like that.


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## somedevildawg (Jun 20, 2011)

Water moccasin....nasty as hell, aggresive with no warning system. Likes to open mouth wide open to reveal "cottonmouth" but that's of no use if you don't see them  deadly snakes....


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## skyrydr2 (Oct 25, 2015)

Damn I hate snakes! And spiders..I kill every snake I see except the green grass snakes theu are pretty harmless. Luckily we dont have many rattlers up here. Mostly garter snakes that will bite you at a moments notice..been bit many time weeding my gardens...


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## Vol (Jul 5, 2009)

It used to be that the drug companies would donate anti-venom to hospitals as a samaritan type thing to do. No longer the case with stockholders and profiteering.

Regards, Mike


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## glasswrongsize (Sep 15, 2015)

somedevildawg said:


> Water moccasin....nasty as hell, aggresive with no warning system. Likes to open mouth wide open to reveal "cottonmouth" but that's of no use if you don't see them  deadly snakes....


Much as I don't mind dry-land snakes such black snakes, garter snakes, and even the cantankerous blue racer; the swimmin snakes give me the heebie jeebies and I'll sit on the bank for hours with my dual exhaust shoostgun to end their reign of terror.

I reckon it will be ok to kill them 'cuz God dun told 'em that they was to crawl on their belly and eat dirt...once they go to disobeyin and go to swimmin around in the pond or crick, they need to be shot just for the sake of shootin!

Mark


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## Teslan (Aug 20, 2011)

I don't know how you southern folks can stay alive. The humidity, all the rain, no "real" seasons of the year. Now I find out about all the snakes angling to kill you without even warning you first.  Like I said in my post above I've only seen one rattler in the wild in my life of 42 years. I'm sure there are more around, but they tend to stay out of more irrigated areas. At least that's what I tell myself..........


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## FarmerCline (Oct 12, 2011)

Teslan said:


> I'm curious. How many poisonous snakes do you guys see a year? I've only seen one rattlesnake in my whole life around the farm. I see bull snakes and garter snakes all the time.


 Copperheads are pretty plentiful here with some timber rattlers mixed in. It is not very often though that I actually encounter one......they usually stay in the wooded areas. I always heard that we had water moccasins here but I have never seen an actual cottonmouth here. What everyone calls water moccasins are actually non venomous water snakes.....they look quite similar to the casual observer.

Once you get a couple hours to the east or south of here closer to the coastal plain region you can add diamondback rattlers, Pygmy rattlers, coral snakes, and true water moccasins to the mix of venomous snakes.

Wow, I had no idea that antivenom was so outrageously expensive before reading that article.


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## somedevildawg (Jun 20, 2011)

Everything (and I mean everything) health related is outrageously expensive.....they leave no stone unturned

My aunt recently went on a cruise and got some kind of blood infection.....add it to the list of reasons why I don't go on cruises.....she had to disembark at Aruba and be admitted to the hospital. She said to me "don't bitch about the price of healthcare too much, you should see what's available in Aruba, it's like a third world country" to which I replied, It is......after 5 days and no improvement she had to hire a medivac firm to come extradite her back to Tallahassee Fl, the company was out of ft lauderdale Fl, cost of medivac? A mere 29k.....stayed in the hospital in Tallahassee for another 7 days, they said if she had stayed in Aruba, the grim reaper would have surely had a meeting with her 

So while it may be unbelievably expensive, the alternative looks bleak....


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## Eastfreo (Aug 15, 2017)

We get quite a few where we are. Mainly some called a dugite and also some tiger snakes. The latter are highly venomous and very aggressive. Fortunately our hospitals still keep anti venom but bites are rare.

Closest call I have had was sitting on the ground in a hay shed having my lunch and a dugite slithered out at my feet and looked at me. I kept very still until it moved away. At that point I somehow went from stretched out on the ground to in the back tray of our old Land Rover in a split second.

However we mostly keep a look out for nasty spiders (red backs) which are everywhere. I was actually bitten by one a year ago and was very ill. I also have a nice little chunk now out of my back where the bite went a bit necrotic.


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## mlappin (Jun 25, 2009)

Nothing like that here, supposedly have back widows and brown recluse spiders here but I've never seen a brown recluse and only ever seen one black widow. Far as snakes go have your typical garter snakes and several others. My wife isn't your typical silly girl, she doesn't mind snakes whatsoever and will pick spiders up in the house and carry them outside rather than kill em.


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## rjmoses (Apr 4, 2010)

Eastfreo said:


> We get quite a few where we are. Mainly some called a dugite and also some tiger snakes. The latter are highly venomous and very aggressive. Fortunately our hospitals still keep anti venom but bites are rare.
> ......
> However we mostly keep a look out for nasty spiders (red backs) which are everywhere. I was actually bitten by one a year ago and was very ill. I also have a nice little chunk now out of my back where the bite went a bit necrotic.


I heard sometime back that Australia has 11 of the 13 most poisonous snakes in the world. I used to think of emigrating to Australia whenever things got me down,

Then I heard about the snakes. I'll take our two-legged snakes (politicians and liberals) any day of the week! Them--I know how to deal with!

Ralph


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## somedevildawg (Jun 20, 2011)

Eastfreo said:


> We get quite a few where we are. Mainly some called a dugite and also some tiger snakes. The latter are highly venomous and very aggressive. Fortunately our hospitals still keep anti venom but bites are rare.
> Closest call I have had was sitting on the ground in a hay shed having my lunch and a dugite slithered out at my feet and looked at me. I kept very still until it moved away. At that point I somehow went from stretched out on the ground to in the back tray of our old Land Rover in a split second.
> However we mostly keep a look out for nasty spiders (red backs) which are everywhere. I was actually bitten by one a year ago and was very ill. I also have a nice little chunk now out of my back where the bite went a bit necrotic.


Ya, I knew y'all were loaded up with venomous snakes and spiders.....black widow and brown recluse spiders (poisonous) and a few million other varieties are purty common here. I had to chuckle about your "episode"....it is truly amazing but a snake, any snake, can make a mortal man walk on water or air . It's like time stands still for a few seconds, you have an out of body experience and suddenly you're somewhere that you weren't a few seconds ago....


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## bool (Mar 14, 2016)

Yes, we punch above our weight as far as venomous snakes are concerned (actually, as far as most critters that can kill you are concerned), but I don't see them often. Maybe once every 10 years I see a snake around the farm.

Roger


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## TJ Hendren (May 12, 2017)

bool said:


> Yes, we punch above our weight as far as venomous snakes are concerned (actually, as far as most critters that can kill you are concerned), but I don't see them often. Maybe once every 10 years I see a snake around the farm.
> 
> Roger


That's once too often for me!


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## luke strawwalker (Jul 31, 2014)

Teslan said:


> I don't know how you southern folks can stay alive. The humidity, all the rain, no "real" seasons of the year. Now I find out about all the snakes angling to kill you without even warning you first.  Like I said in my post above I've only seen one rattler in the wild in my life of 42 years. I'm sure there are more around, but they tend to stay out of more irrigated areas. At least that's what I tell myself..........


You forgot gators and mosquitoes...

Since the 25 inches of rain from Harvey, our farm is now a "state bird" sanctuary... the mosquitoes nearly carried us off before we could get from the pickup into the house with 3 bags and our pillows...

Later! OL J R


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## luke strawwalker (Jul 31, 2014)

somedevildawg said:


> Ya, I knew y'all were loaded up with venomous snakes and spiders.....black widow and brown recluse spiders (poisonous) and a few million other varieties are purty common here. I had to chuckle about your "episode"....it is truly amazing but a snake, any snake, can make a mortal man walk on water or air . It's like time stands still for a few seconds, you have an out of body experience and suddenly you're somewhere that you weren't a few seconds ago....


That's for sure...

A couple decades ago, I was fetching an old cotton picker blower out of a junk pile for a project I had in mind... it was already November and pretty cool, so I didn't think much about snakes. Well, this was down in the woods and I put the 3 point crane on the tractor and was latching a chain onto this blower to carry it back to the house, and I felt that my feet were moving under me, and I didn't know why... I looked down to see that I was standing on a water moccasin, who was slithering around back and forth trying to get free... I guess if I had a 250 pound guy standing on me in boots I'd be trying to get free too... Thing was, about the front 6 inches of him was free and wiggling around, but he'd about had enough and was starting to double back on me when I looked down...

Now, as anybody can tell from my avatar pic above, I ain't exactly what you'd call a little guy, let alone "light on my feet"... But I swear, somehow I managed to outjump one of them 9 foot tall 150 pound NBA basketball players, because I jumped off that snake and landed about 6 feet away in about 1/10 of a second... I don't even know how I did it... All I know was he was happy to go his way, and I was happy to go mine...

Don't like snakes at all... I'm a fan of the theory espoused by Colonel Trautman in the first Rambo movie, "First Blood" -- "If in doubt, KILL! Win by attrition!"

I read about an illegal Mexican who was hitchhiking across some pretty remote area in Texas a number of years ago... he had stopped walking to take a little break, sat down by a guardrail, and leaned back with his hands flat on the ground, and felt a sudden burning pain, looked around to see a coral snake latched onto his finger...

Well, he did what any quick thinking guy would do (I guess)... he grabbed his pocketknife, killed the snake, skinned it, and used the snakeskin to make a tourniquet to put around his finger until he could flag someone down and get to the hospital... He received treatment and came through it just fine, and with a nice hatband to boot... LOL

Later! OL J R


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## luke strawwalker (Jul 31, 2014)

mlappin said:


> Nothing like that here, supposedly have back widows and brown recluse spiders here but I've never seen a brown recluse and only ever seen one black widow. Far as snakes go have your typical garter snakes and several others. My wife isn't your typical silly girl, she doesn't mind snakes whatsoever and will pick spiders up in the house and carry them outside rather than kill em.


For a long time after we got fire ants, we didn't see ANY black widows... I guess the fire ants cleaned them up... I grew up knowing what they were from pictures and stuff and that they're around, but never really saw any...

I guess though that nature found a new balance, because now we see more black widows. They're worse at Shiner, in the drier climate, and they get even worse in a dry year. I've seen some here too... in fact needed to do something under Dad's house a few years back and saw the biggest one I'd ever seen in my life-- her abdomen was as big around as my thumb!

Dad's best friend Franklin got bit by a black widow while he was sitting in the outhouse doing his business as a kid... His mom grabbed him up, threw him in the bed, and put every blanket and quilt in the house spread out over him, despite the nearly 100 degree heat, and sweated it out of him... wasn't any antivenom in those days... he was sick as a dog for a few days and weak for a week or two, but he came through it just fine...

One time (before my time) my Dad's sister and BIL visited the Shiner farm with their little daughter (my oldest cousin, probably in her late 50's by now I think) and she got bit by a scorpion on the farm up there... RB (her Dad) grabbed her up, threw her into the car, and nearly killed them all flying up the dirt roads to the hospital in town... rushed her in and the doctors and nurses just laughed... the scorpions we have aren't deadly, they're just painful like a really bad wasp bite... He'd seen the Bond movie "Diamonds are Forever" where the bad guys drop a scorpion down the back of a guy's shirt collar, it stings him, and he collapses and dies within seconds, and figured Sandra was about done for...

It is funny, though, how "light on our feet" we can be when we have to... One time Jay (my younger brother) and I were getting cotton trailers ready for picking season, and I started climbing up the ladder on the front of one trailer to do some repairs up inside the trailer... I was nearly to the top when I looked up and saw about a foot in front of my face, a big ol' yellow jacket nest about the size of a friggin football, with about 2,000 beady little compound eyes staring back at me, antennae flicking ominously and wings rising... I didn't even look... I just let go of the trailer ladder and kicked off like a friggin' Olympic high diver, did a backwards half-turn half-flip and landed right on top of my brother, knocking him to the ground flat on his butt with me on top of him, both of us sprawled out in the dirt... He shoves me off and we get up, him cussing me a blue streak while I knock the dust off him and myself while he's shouting "what the h3ll was that about??" and I just pointed up to the nest of yellow jackets... he stood there a second, looked at it, and said sheepishly, "I'd have done the same thing." LOL

About ten years ago, we had a partial solar eclipse late in the afternoon-- about an hour before sunset, so it was gonna be REALLY spectacular... because of the trees and crap on the west side of the farm, we decided to drive up the road a couple miles and park on the side of the road by a cornfield that my Dad used to farm when he was renting land and I was a wee little kid... Betty, Keira, and I enjoyed the eclipse, despite the late summer heat, and watched it through welding glasses and stuff til it was over. Keira was just a little kid of 3-4 at the time I guess, and still had that "little kid stomach" that doesn't deal with heat too well... She hadn't been feeling well and was kinda green around the gills and Betty had had enough of the eclipse and got in the truck, and Keira was standing in the back seat hanging out the window fussing at me to come on and go home as I was taking the last few pics... I turned around to talk to her, standing right beside the window, when she suddenly just let loose and puked up everything she'd eaten for the last week, from the looks of it anyway...

Like I said, I ain't exactly dainty nor small, but somehow I managed to jump up and backwards by around 3-4 feet in the time it took for her puke to travel from her mouth and splatter all over the ground I had just been standing on beside the pickup window about a half-second before... didn't get a drop on me... LOL

Later! OL J R


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## FarmerCline (Oct 12, 2011)

Was loading some bales that were stacked on pallets this morning. Picked up one of the bales and laying between it the other bale was a small timber rattlesnake. Luckily it was just laying curled up and wasn't aggressive. First one I have seen in a couple years. Kind of a coincidence since we just has this thread on venomous snakes.


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## Wethay (Jul 17, 2015)

Bales stacked on pallets so when the pee runs down your leg it doesn't get the bales wet?


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## FarmerCline (Oct 12, 2011)

Wethay said:


> Bales stacked on pallets so when the pee runs down your leg it doesn't get the bales wet?


 LOL, never thought about that. Seriously though it was a bit of a scare to pick up a bale and see a rattler sitting there.


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## RockmartGA (Jun 29, 2011)

I guess I should tell my "snake" story.

Picking up small squares when I felt something "squishy". Looked down and saw where we had baled up a snake. Threw the bale about 50 feet (not true, more like 10 feet), screamed like a six year old girl (true), and did the Riverdance (Sorta true. Feet were moving but I wasn't going anywhere). Thought my wife was going to have a stroke from laughing so hard.


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## vhaby (Dec 30, 2009)

Was mowing some tall Bahia grass in a portion of the yard several weeks ago on a JD 155 riding mower. As I turned, I briefly glimpsed an unusual brown spot in the grass beside the mower deck. I turned around out of curiosity and saw a two-foot long copperhead, one of our local poisonous snakes. The snake was headed toward the house and I instantly thought about running into the house for the 12-gauge shotgun, but quickly realized that I had the ideal snake killer under me. It took three times running over the copperhead for him to stick his head up under the deck. You can imagine what he looked like after that.


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## Ray 54 (Aug 2, 2014)

First rule of hay hauling by hand in California is tip the bale to you and see who is living under it. Never had a rattle snake yet,but lots of gopher and king snakes,mice and lizards.

Always have to have rattle snakes on your mind. Have dug hibernating ones out of wood piles in winter bring it out of field to house.

Thinking I was watching close came within 6 inches of one by a valve I was turning to fill a water tank for the cows.

Always kill several on the ranch every year,some years over a dozen. Only a few times I have heard one before seeing it. I don't know just how,but seems generally just a glance and I can tell a rattle snake apart from the rest.

Ag web just had a piece on snake bits and how the price of anti venom was from $6000 to $22000 a dose depending on the hospital. All the cases they reported took more than one dose.


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## luke strawwalker (Jul 31, 2014)

RockmartGA said:


> I guess I should tell my "snake" story.
> 
> Picking up small squares when I felt something "squishy". Looked down and saw where we had baled up a snake. Threw the bale about 50 feet (not true, more like 10 feet), screamed like a six year old girl (true), and did the Riverdance (Sorta true. Feet were moving but I wasn't going anywhere). Thought my wife was going to have a stroke from laughing so hard.


LOL

We were sprigging a field of bermuda years ago... bought an OLD one-row 3point hitch sprigger from up the country and got tops from a guy about 40 miles south of here... my brother was running the tractor and sprigger, and I was pulling the trailer behind the pickup and feeding in tops as he needed it (frequently). I pulled up and had been loading tops with the pitchfork, but the tops were all matted together and just being a total PITA to fork because they wouldn't pull apart, so I started just gathering up armloads and dumping them into the machine... I went back for another armload and heard my brother yelling behind me, turned around to see a coral snake slither out of the last armload of tops and go over the side of the sprigger onto the ground and under the trailer, heading for the ditch.

Switched back to the pitchfork post-haste... LOL

Later! OL J R


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## luke strawwalker (Jul 31, 2014)

vhaby said:


> Was mowing some tall Bahia grass in a portion of the yard several weeks ago on a JD 155 riding mower. As I turned, I briefly glimpsed an unusual brown spot in the grass beside the mower deck. I turned around out of curiosity and saw a two-foot long copperhead, one of our local poisonous snakes. The snake was headed toward the house and I instantly thought about running into the house for the 12-gauge shotgun, but quickly realized that I had the ideal snake killer under me. It took three times running over the copperhead for him to stick his head up under the deck. You can imagine what he looked like after that.


LOL

Years ago I helped a friend of my Dad (who we used to be partners in hay I grew on his farm-- he provided the land, I provided the equipment and most of the labor). He had some damage to the house after a BAD storm rolled through and I was lending him a hand, and my younger brother (who was about middle-school age at the time) had come over to help. Dad's friend immediately put him to work mowing the grass, while we worked on roofing...

SO, Jay takes off around the back of the house on the riding mower, mows a little while, and we hear him shut off the deck and come whipping around the side of the house from the back and his eyes are big as quarters and he pulls up beside us and says, "There was a SNAKE back there!"

Franklin, Dad's friend, doesn't miss a beat, looks straight at him, and says, "was it a black snake?" "Yeah!" my lil brother breathlessly said... "I think so!"

Without missing a beat, Franklin says, "Oh, be careful of those-- that's a jumpin' snake..." My brother's eyes widen and his mouth falls open... "REALLY??" he said...

Franklin said, "Yup... be careful; they'll jump up and bite onto your @ss and won't let go til sunset...", at which point we BOTH bust out laughing, just about to bust a gut... My brother turns red and gets PO'd and Franklin told him, "h3ll, boy, you're on a mower... just run over the [email protected] thing and keep going!"

LOL

Later! OL J R


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## weatherman (Dec 5, 2008)

somedevildawg said:


> Everything (and I mean everything) health related is outrageously expensive.....they leave no stone unturned
> 
> My aunt recently went on a cruise and got some kind of blood infection.....add it to the list of reasons why I don't go on cruises.....she had to disembark at Aruba and be admitted to the hospital. She said to me "don't bitch about the price of healthcare too much, you should see what's available in Aruba, it's like a third world country" to which I replied, It is......after 5 days and no improvement she had to hire a medivac firm to come extradite her back to Tallahassee Fl, the company was out of ft lauderdale Fl, cost of medivac? A mere 29k.....stayed in the hospital in Tallahassee for another 7 days, they said if she had stayed in Aruba, the grim reaper would have surely had a meeting with her
> 
> So while it may be unbelievably expensive, the alternative looks bleak....


Happy to hear your Aunt came through ok. Hope the insurance company picked up most if not all tab.


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## panhandle9400 (Jan 17, 2010)

This season we killed 57 rattlers between 3 of us . Had a heeler dog bitten 3 times this summer she is a snake killing machine , she has been bitten 5 times in 2 summers, dont even phase her . 2nd cutting of alfalfa had one by the tail on the end of a 4x4x8 bale sitting on the accumulator as I walked around it struck at my face , scared hell out of me , was not expecting that .


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## somedevildawg (Jun 20, 2011)

And that, my friends, is why they call it "no mans land".....


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## panhandle9400 (Jan 17, 2010)

somedevildawg said:


> And that, my friends, is why they call it "no mans land".....


You know the funny part of that is ? back when the US Gov kept indians here they moved them due to the area was too inhospitable for them . I ask my Dad why we ended up here and he told me son this is where the money ran out . I have the 5th generation growing up right now to be Dust Bowl tough .O heck I forgot that fact too epic center of the dust bowl . Ifn you are not tough and have survival skills dont come here to make a living . bahahaha


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## Hayjosh (Mar 24, 2016)

I used to make veterinary antivenom. I developed an antivenom blend from 4 venoms--Mojave rattle snake because it was neurotoxic, Eastern Diamondback, Western Diamondback, and Cottonmouth/Water moccassin (because it's such a common bite). The result was to have a cocktail antivenom that had broad reactivity so it would be effective against other closely related venoms.

It's not easy to make. You need a source of the venom first. And that means there's some pour soul holding these things by the head and milking them out with a piece of parafilm over a beaker and putting their fangs through the parafilm. I'd receive the venom and make a vaccine from them. Then you need a large herd of horses or sheep to hyperimmunize to create the antibodies to the venom (which is what the antivenom is).

Then you need to collect blood from the animal, fractionate that into serum or plasma, and then purify the antibody fraction. Because it's an intravenous product, it needs to be 100% sterile and endotoxin load must be very, very low or you induce endotoxic shock in the patient.

You also need to test the antibodies for venom neutralization. There are several ways this can be done, either by incubating the venom with the antivenom and then injecting into mice, or using an egg embryo model where a fertilized egg embryo is removed from the shell and subsequently tested against the venom to determine if neutralization was achieved.

Putting an animal antibody into a human intravenously runs a high risk of anaphylaxis. Immunologically, you pretty much get one shot at the antivenom. If you get bit a second time in your life and need to receive antivenom again, you run a significantly higher risk of anaphylaxis as you've created antibodies to the horse or sheep antibodies you received after the first time you were bit. It requires a lot of QC and safety testing, but even as a big pharma scientist myself I'm trying to figure out how a dose can be $6-22k. To put it in perspective, the veterinary antivenom I made was less than $200/dose.

One of my best friends is starting up his own company to make antivenom. Maybe there will be cheaper alternatives someday. I wish him the best but wouldn't wish a start up endeavor in human medicine on anybody. Been there, got the shirt as well. It might take a decade or more and tens or hundreds of millions of dollars to get a drug developed and initiated into FDA trials, only to have it fail in the second round of trials.

If you get nothing else out of this, hopefully it's a healthy appreciation of what all has to go into making something such as this.


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## Vol (Jul 5, 2009)

Hayjosh said:


> Putting an animal antibody into a human intravenously runs a high risk of anaphylaxis. Immunologically, you pretty much get one shot at the antivenom. If you get bit a second time in your life and need to receive antivenom again, you run a significantly higher risk of anaphylaxis as you've created antibodies to the horse or sheep antibodies you received after the first time you were bit.


Did not know that about the second bite......as far as pricing goes, I would say that is par for the course. Good luck to your friends developments.

Regards, Mike


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## endrow (Dec 15, 2011)

When I think of this subject I wonder did anyone hear ever get be venom injections to try to become desensitized for bee sting . 20 years ago I walked into yellow jackets all over my body almost died from it . Dr recommended I would get 3 types of bee venom injections regularly over an 18 month period and I ran into a major problem from the injections . I wonder if anyone on hear ever had bee venom injections for this type thing


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## Hayjosh (Mar 24, 2016)

endrow said:


> When I think of this subject I wonder did anyone hear ever get be venom injections to try to become desensitized for bee sting . 20 years ago I walked into yellow jackets all over my body almost died from it . Dr recommended I would get 3 types of bee venom injections regularly over an 18 month period and I ran into a major problem from the injections . I wonder if anyone on hear ever had bee venom injections for this type thing


I developed a sting allergy last year, I'm on a 5 year shot schedule. My shots are for 5 venoms given in three injections. I was getting them once a week for 3 months and then tapered off to every 2, then 3, 4 weeks, etc. Now I'll continue to get them every 8 weeks for 4 years.

It's a good point you bring up. Receiving a series of venom injections absolutely will desensitize you and in fact this is exactly how antivenom is made. The horses or sheep that are making the antivenom receive a shot of the venom. They initially start off with a very small dose, and receive regular immunizations over time with increasing dosage. This is how tetanus antitoxin is also made.

The reason they have shots for bee venoms but not snake venoms are because everybody is allergic and sensitive to snake venom (and this is not so with stings). And snake venom will really eff you up. While bee venom shots can put you in anaphylaxis that's usually remedied with epinephrine, a snake venom shot gone wrong can be much more serious. It can cause serious lesions, granulomas, and even necrosis at the site of injection. Therefore there's so much risk in protecting yourself for an event that's pretty rare. And in the event you do get bit, then you receive the antivenom. Even if you received shots, they're still probably going to dose you with antivenom to be safe. The second factor is demand of the product and supply of venom. There wouldn't be enough demand for it to be profitable and would likely be prohibitively expensive (to which insurance would not want to cover because there's already a 'cure' or treatment). Yet for what demand there would be, it would be very difficult and dangerous to consistently produce that amount of venom for injections.

The second part to this is you can use the same amount of venom to immunize a horse to which you can then make thousands of doses of antivenom from that horse's serum. But when you immunize a person, you protect only them.

Also go back to what I mentioned previously. You get one chance at receiving antivenom (which is also risky). Do you want to risk wasting that chance on a preventable occasion like a shot for something you might not ever get bitten by, or would you rather save the antivenom for if you do get bitten and your life (or limb) depends on it?


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## Coondle (Aug 28, 2013)

Just returned from a fishing trip at a place called Cape Arid which is on Western Australia's South-East coast (Check Mr Google).

It is quite remote, the nearest town of Esperance (population about 10,500) to where I camped was 150 km (94 miles) involving 25 km (16 miles) of loose beach-sand 4wd driving, then 80km (50 miles) on unsealed road before reaching a sealed (tarmac) road. There is no larger town between Esperance and Perth with about 720 km (450 miles) by road.

Driving on the beach, a wide white sandy beach at 7.30 in the morning encountered a large tiger snake, within the top 5 most potent venoms in the world, making his way from the breakers back into the sand hills. He was angry and took up the classic strike pose, with flattened head (it is related the cobra) to give maximum warning, equivalent to the rattler's rattles.

Would not want to be bitten by him, there would be a 2 1/2 hour drive to a small hospital which at best would only have polyvalent anti-venom ie not specific to any snake species. Our small country hospitals cannot afford to keep specific anti-venoms because of high cost and relatively short shelf life in relation to instances of use. Survival but long-term damage would have been the likely outcome. Statistically few people die of snakebite in Australia, only a couple each year.

For those interested in Australian snakebites and treatment here is a link to a very good paper on the subject.

www.anaesthesia.med.usyd.edu.au/resources/venom/snakebite.html

One thing that struck me in the paper is that Australian snakebites are painless.

The group of snakes mentioned as "brown snakes" account for most bites because they are the

most widely distributed and occur in populated areas.

Baled a couple of snakes that I know of. Here is a pic of the most recent, in the bandit bundle. This one is a Banded Gwader, a brown snake family member , with about the 8th or 9th most potent venom in the world. I believe it is a female that had taken up residence in/near my hay shed and was baled up nearby.


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## Vol (Jul 5, 2009)

I googled your Tiger.....it is a evil looking son of a gun. It would be very difficult to let him slide by if in a position to do otherwise. You folks certainly have a wide variety of venomous fangs in your part of the world.

I heard yesterday that some scientists are insisting on claims that Oz broke off from the US....if that is the case, you certainly got the part with the most serpent toxins.

Stride easy Kevin.

Regards, Mike


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## somedevildawg (Jun 20, 2011)

"Quite remote" is an understatement......did you exterminate the serpent?


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## Hayjosh (Mar 24, 2016)

Coondle said:


> Would not want to be bitten by him, there would be a 2 1/2 hour drive to a small hospital which at best would only have polyvalent anti-venom ie not specific to any snake species.


Well, not exactly. Polyvalent antivenom (which is what I described I was making in my earlier post) will be specific to whatever venoms were used to make it. Polyvalent just implies it's a blend of antivenoms and in the end that's literally how it's made. You take antivenom A, antivenom B, antivenom C, and antivenom D and mix them together in the same bottle. The idea with polyvalent antivenoms is to try to cover the most common snake bites in a single preparation for a 'universal' antivenom so you're hopefully covered regardless of which snake you're bitten by. You also get some cross-reactivity across antibodies to different venoms so the other objective of a polyvalent antivenom is to be as broad spectrum as possible.


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## Coondle (Aug 28, 2013)

Vol said:


> I googled your Tiger.....it is a evil looking son of a gun. It would be very difficult to let him slide by if in a position to do otherwise. You folks certainly have a wide variety of venomous fangs in your part of the world.
> 
> I heard yesterday that some scientists are insisting on claims that Oz broke off from the US....if that is the case, you certainly got the part with the most serpent toxins.
> 
> ...


We got the bite bits, but you got the pick of the politicians Ha ha ha

I was going to say that I did not know which was the worst snake, but on reflection I do and we do not have anti-venom for that type.



somedevildawg said:


> "Quite remote" is an understatement......did you exterminate the serpent?


No, I let him pass, after all I was in a National Park and he was certainly not around a populated area. The size both as to length (I estimate over 5 feet, approaching maybe 6 feet) and girth (larger than my wrist) indicated he may be up to 70 or so years of age

At birth they are (Born live) about 200mm (8 inches) long and about as fat as a flattish pencil. They grow rapidly in length but slowly in girth. Tiger populations vary greatly in size usually depending on habitat, some types only grow to about 3 feet in length. If the habitat and food supply permit they may grow to much larger sizes, one particular island population can reach 2.4 metres (8 feet).

After they reach a length of about 900 mm or 3 feet the growth rate slows down and they then grow very slowly in length and then grow slowly in girth.They eat anything that they can including fish and can swim underwater despite popular myth that poisonous snakes swim fully inflated so are limited to the surface. Their diet includes birds bats frogs tadpoles small mammals and even dead animals.

A local person camped nearby commented that he had seen one swimming in the sea.

Kangaroos in some areas, at least, seem to swim in the ocean to free themselves of ticks, the snakes may do the same.

So far as remoteness, on my bucket list is a trip along te Canning Stock Route, Google Youtube and Netflix it, it is amazing. 1850 km (1150 miles) of wilderness track across 3 of our deserts with in recent years an Aborigional Community with fuel in about the middle. Here is a link:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canning_Stock_Route


 
 

I will post a few photos of the area I went fishing in, under another topic:
"White Sand and Sea" in Chit Chat and Intros.


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## Vol (Jul 5, 2009)

Your right about our politicians Kevin, and about 98% of them need their feet and arms cut off so that they too can slither on their bellies.

Regards Mike


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## NebTrac (Aug 12, 2014)

I've never really had any close calls with snakes. There is the occasional prairie rattler, but here, but if they are seen it is typically south of me about 10 miles.

One crazy story I heard is about a bull snake and a rattler. I guess they came in contact with each other and and started to fight. They chased each other round. The bull snake grabbed the tail of the rattler and the rattler got a hold of the tail of the bull snake. They started to eat each other and didn't stop until they were both gone. -_-

Troy


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## Coondle (Aug 28, 2013)

Sadly a heavily pregnant woman and her unborn child are reported on the news services to have died from a "suspected" snake bite in Meekatharra, a small town about 450 miles North East of Perth. The woman was taken to the local hospital but died very quickly, and the medicos frantic efforts to save the child failed.

Here are links to media reports :

www.abc.net.au/news/2018-02-06/pregnant...snake-bite...in-meekatharra.../9400752


 

www.news.com.au/national/...snake-bite/.../41f8492d4ce051746896aa52897d7887

Under one version of the most deadly snakes (taking into account the amount of venom in a strike) the death adder rates equal 10 th in the world along wth the Mojave Rattlesnake, the Black Mamba, and both species of Green Mamba.

The death adder is an ambush predator lying in leaf litter or some place of concealment. It has a fat sluggish body and a very small reduced tail which it wiggles as a bait for reptiles, small mammals, frogs and birds to attack as a meal. The death adder strike is very fast and usually high levels of a a complex venom are injected. It has been rated as the fastest striking snake in the world with the capacity to go from strike position, strike, envenomate and return ready to strike in 0.15 seconds, yes 15/100 ths of a second. Some measurements put this as fast as 0.13 of a second.

Three women have died rapidly from snakebite in relatively recent years in Western Australia. The US has more than three times the number of deaths from snakebite compared with Australia.

The previous 2 women were victims of a brown snake type, each dying within 20 minutes of being bitten and before getting an ambulance to them.


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## U Lazy V Ranch (Nov 30, 2020)

One winter I went hauling straw for an outfit in NW WA, from around the Umatilla, OR area. We got to the stacks in the dark and were hauling 41 4x4x8 bales at a time. We loaded ourselves with an ancient Scoop Mobile, that had one 4" light, mounted on the side. All in all, you couldn't see much, and when you got to putting the 3rd bale high, you could reach out and touch the load just about. I was in the cab in my insulated coveralls, about 11pm, loading my first load, and these clumps of mud kept falling out of the stack and landing on me, and in my lap. I didn't pay much attention, but would grab them with my mittened hand and toss them out the front. Finally, curiosity got the best of me and I took one in front of the light so I could get a good look. It was a hibernating rattle snake!!! I wasn't raised anywhere that had anything like that, and to say the least, I wasn't impressed!!! I never did see one that could or would move that winter, but it sure kept me awake! In the summer, they'd crawl under the trailers and rattle when we'd go to hook our straps to the winches. I never got bit, but I sure about wet my pants more than a few times!!!
John


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