WHAT?! The five other venomous snakes in the U.S. most people don't know about!

As discussed in a quoted article earlier in the thread, "venomous" does not necessarily mean dangerous. Venomous stands on its own and simply means "having a venomous/toxic/poisonous bite". Some venomous snakes are harmless, some are medically significant, and some are deadly. Certainly there are different types of snake venom, i.e. hemotoxic, neurotoxic, cytotoxic. With all due respect, I think by "truly venomous" you mean "venomous and dangerous". I'm not arguing that hog-nosed snakes are dangerous. But they are venomous.

That's super cool you worked with Bob Jenni and his hot herps. Did he develop an immunity to the venom after being bitten so many times?

I worked in the reptile house at a zoo in California when in college. The only hots they had were chill rattlesnakes and copperheads. The rattlesnakes were all captive bred and were not aggressive. I was more apprehensive about the giant pythons and boas they had. A giant python craps a pile as large as a Rottweiler, btw.

Ever seen Viperkeeper's YouTube channel? That guy has all the deadly vemomous snakes and handles them.

Here's an article with lots of info about hog-nosed snake envenomation. It turns out Western hog-nosed snake venom affects mammals more than Eastern hog-nosed snake venom. Also Western hog-nosed snakes have larger venom glands than their Eastern cousins. The effects in humans from Western hog-nosed snake envenomation is similar but milder to that of copperheads.


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Envenomation by Western Hog-nosed Snakes

The Western Hog-nosed Snake [Heterodon nasicus] possesses a pair of enlarged venom glands behind the maxillae and rear fangs. Venom exits the glands through ducts connecting to the fang sheath. These glands are not enlarged in the Eastern Hog-nosed Snake (Heterodon platyrhinos; Kroll 1976). Kroll (1976) tested the effects of H. nasicus venom on a sample of 10 Eastern Fence Lizards (Sceloporus undulatus) by injecting each with 0.2 ml of venom extract. He found that all 10 lizards exhibited edema within about ½ hour, 7 were immobilized within an average of 1.7 hr, and 5 had died within an average of 3.7 hr (at least one within the first hour). Extracts from two other cranial glands produced some swelling over longer time periods than from the venom glands, but resulted in immobilization and death in only 2 and 1 lizards, respectively.

McAlister (1963) tested the effects of H. platyrhinos venom (up to 1.0 ml) on samples of adult male white mice and a series of small anurans and found no effects to the mice, but most of the anurans died within 24 hr. He concluded that Heterodon toxins would be ineffectual in producing symptoms in humans.

I witnessed the Western Hog-nosed Snake’s quick reflexes, as noted above, and experienced its envenomation first-hand on 9 July 2006. The specimen of interest is a 60-cm (total length) male snake that I collected in Runnels County, Texas, on 23 May 1990 (57 cm at capture) and have since maintained in captivity. The snake readily takes mice, is habituated to feeding, and is very alert to movement near its cage. On 9 July at about 2030h, I was changing its water bowl when the snake darted half way out of the cage’s front-sliding door, apparently expecting a mouse. Not having a mouse, I gently placed my hand under its body and lifted it back into the cage. As I was setting it down, the snake whipped around and struck my left fifth finger on the inside surface of the middle knuckle, nearly encircling the entire finger. Since I had not been handling anything that could have left residual scent of a prey item, I initially expected the snake to release my finger when it discovered that it was not a mouse. I placed my hand and the snake on a coffee table to see if it would voluntarily release my finger.

Contrary to my expectations, the snake forcefully began manipulating its jaws and engaged its rear fangs, which I could distinctly feel penetrating nearly to the bone (there’s not much meat on my little finger!) Given the extent to which the snake’s mouth encircled my finger, and not wanting to injure it during removal, I gently tried to pry its jaws away from my finger with a pencil. This only caused the snake to engage the opposite fang even more vigorously, producing increasingly sharp pain with each contraction of its jaws.

Resorting to Plan B, I placed the snake and my finger under moderately flowing water from the kitchen faucet for almost a minute with no relief of the solid grip. Back to Plan A and the pencil: this time I dislodged the right rear fang with one pencil and used a second pencil to disengage the snake’s lower jaw, allowing me to free my finger. This entire process lasted approximately 10 min. I then indelicately returned the snake to its cage, carrying it by the tip of its tail (think Crocodile Hunter handling an 8-foot black mamba).

The wounds from the fangs bled freely, and I washed my hand with antibacterial soap and applied an un-medicated band-aid. With relief from the fang-piercing pain, I now experienced a milder stinging sensation in immediate vicinity of bite. My finger swelled slightly from the site of the bite to the distal knuckle, which prevented bending the finger. During the evening the swelling spread to the middle knuckle of my ring finger, so I removed my wedding band to prevent further constriction. By the end of the evening, the swollen area had increased about 5-6 cm along the outside of my hand and itched. On 10 July, the swelling extended an additional 2-3 cm along my hand, had a slight purplish coloration, and I was unable to ball a fist.

The stinging and itching had subsided, but was replaced with a slight soreness. On 11 July, my hand had no discoloration, and the swelling was reduced in the fifth finger. My ring finger was still too swollen to wear my wedding band, and the swelling in my hand was similar to the previous day. I experienced mild, throbbing pain all day. On 12 July, all swelling had diminished, but the knuckle at the site of the bite was sensitive to touch or light pressure. Finally, all symptoms had disappeared by 13 July, 4 days after the bite.

Several cases of hog-nosed snake envenomation of humans have been reported in the literature. My experience resembled those from H. nasicus bites reported by Bragg (1960), Kroll (1976), and Morris (1985), with various differences. Bragg, bitten on the thumb, experienced swelling about 1/3 the way up his arm; tenderness (not associated with the region of the wound) lasted for a period of about two weeks. Kroll experienced pain extending from a bite on his thumb up to his elbow. Morris suffered oozing blood and fluid until the day after a bite on his right fourth finger and developed blisters that lasted almost two days. Walley (2002) reported a more serious case, in which a middle-aged male struck on the ankle experienced edema for three weeks, as well as extensive hemorrhaging that covered most of the foot and extended about 10 cm up the leg. Tissues did not return to normal for almost 3 months. Finally, Grogan (1974) reported envenomation from a bite by a H. platyrhinos near the wrist of a 16-year old boy. The boy experienced nausea in addition to swelling, discoloration, and tenderness. All pain had dissipated within 2 days, but pus, possibly from a secondary infection, was evident several days later.

Morris (1985) noted that toxic effects had been reported for all recorded bites by H. nasicus, but only 1 of 3 by H. platyrhinos, suggesting that H. nasicus may have venom more toxic to mammals. This is consistent with the toxicity experiments conducted by McAlister (1963) and Kroll (1976), as well as the more specialized amphibian diet of H. platyrhinos (Werler and Dixon 2000). The larger venom gland of H. nasicus compared to H. platyrhinos (Kroll 1976) may also play a role in the amount of venom delivered, thus affecting subsequent reactions.

[link to tucsonherpsociety.org (secure)]

There's, the Bushes,Biden's and Clinton's but they are only found on 14 story balconies.

Can any medical people comment on this?

Just a joke:
bankers
rattlesnakes
bankers
copperheads
bankers
water moccasins
bankers
coral snakes
.
.
bankers

In my neck of the woods the muskeg takes more lives than the wildlife.

Want to see a couple of them being born?


[link to youtu.be (secure)]

You’re right. I hadn’t hear of those other ones.

Almost stepped on a copperhead last year on a walk and I regularly see rattlesnakes at the beach. I’m pretty sure coral snakes are neurotoxic which is awesome. Seems 99% of people are terrified of them. They’re actual really cool IMO.

[imgur] [link to imgur.com (secure)]

Hahahahahahahahahahananana

I’m sorry, but being worried about a hog-nose for their venom is like saying you’re worried about opossums for their rabies.

That's probably what this guy said.

[imgur] [link to imgur.com (secure)]
Source: [link to www.reptilefact.com (secure)]

Americans taking about venomous snakes

You left out Joe Biden, Kamala Harris, PelosiSnake and SchumerSnake. Poison to the bone.

Of course Australia has the world's deadliest snakes and everyone knows of them. But there's the lesser-known brown tree snake or brown catsnake. It's one of the few colubrids in Oz and is rear-fanged with mild venom. Their bite is trivial to adults but can be medically serious for children.

[link to en.wikipedia.org (secure)]

I’ve also heard of people dying by water allergies.

Did you bother reading that link?



The hog-nose is notorious for playing dead. Search it on YouTube.

And the opossum is notorious for being resistant to rabies.

Are you a northerner, by chance?

Last Edited by Shilliam the Third on 02/10/2021 05:00 AM

Any snake I see mowing gets chopped up. Fuck em all. haha

I’ll do you a favor..


So scary!

My nieces have a pet one they interact with daily. Grow a pair of fucking balls, OP.

Last Edited by Shilliam the Third on 02/10/2021 05:04 AM

Yes. The person who wrote that was wrong. The picture farther down the web page proves that person was wrong. Aren't you smart enough to recognize a self-contradiction? I've shared other links which firmly nail down that hog-nosed snakes are toxic/venomous/poisonous but not dangerous. A swollen arm and blisters are no big thing for a junkie like you, right?

Don’t blame me for pointing out fallacies..

Every rattle snake i find i shoot with the good ole 410 ...blows thier heads off each time...

Damn those snakes to hell.....

A toddler in my community was bitten by a young rattler a few days ago. He underwent emergency surgery and recovered after almost 30 vials of anti venom. Poor little guy.

It's nothing to be afraid of, just aware.

Your mom calls them the brass clankers.

That’s horrible! Praying on a full recovery.


Thank you. He is at home now & doing much better!

You're a waterhead, aren't you?

Wow - that's a lot of anti-venom! Thankfully the hospital had that much in stock.

Once I was on a riding lawn mower in tall grass and thought I hit a branch. I thought I saw the grass moving after that. Later I found a dead bullsnake slightly smaller than this one with its tail missing.

[imgur] [link to imgur.com (secure)]

It's humans vs the animal kingdom. I'm on the side of the humans. Rattlesnakes have got to go!

Here’s the story, if you care to read it. The young boy is very lucky.

[link to foxsanantonio.com (secure)]

Last Edited by Rabbit In The Hat on 02/10/2021 05:44 AM

Awful. But great medical care + kid pulls through + wrangler found and removed the snake = win

What about the dreaded Pelosi cobra?