How to avoid and overcome a snake attack?

golok

golok

Joined
Oct 20, 2000
Messages
4,453
Most times snakes avoid humans. These slippery creatures, I was told, have learnt that humans are detrimental to their health.

However, there are times when some species of snakes attack without provocation.

In these circumstances, how does a chicken-hearted trekker avoid such a potentially calamitous situation and live to tell the tale?

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Make Love your strongest weapon. Compassion your shield and forgiveness your armour.
 
The only time snakes attack without provocation is in the horror movies. Snakes can tell you are a lot bigger than they are, and will retreat if you give them a chance.

Just remain perfectly still, and a snake will leave as soon as he is certain that you are not attacking.

The world expert in envenomations is Dr. Findley Russell, Ph. D., M.D. he is with the University of Arizona. I have had the pleasure of hearing him speak on two occasions. Dr. Russell said that the vast majority of snake bites occur within the confines of a city, and most often happen to young males who are handling their 'pet' snakes after imbibing alcohol. Snake bites which occur while on the trail away from cities are vanishingly rare.

Don't administer antivenin for rattlesnake bites. First of all, the typical envenomation requires about a dozen amps, more than you would be carrying, and secondly, the antivenin is an equine (horse) serum; this means that an anaphylactic (serious allergic) reaction is possible. Antivenin is properly given in the ICU setting, with a central IV line in place. Almost all people given antivenin develop serum sickness, which consists of joint swelling and tenderness. This also often requires treatment.

Don't apply a tourniquet or ice, don't cut the bite site. Don't do anything except get yourself transported to the nearest emergency room.

Most snakebites are not true envenomations, and require no treatment at all.

Hope this helps,

Walter Welch MD, Diplomate, American Board of Emergency Medicine
 
Sorry; just saw that you are from Malaysia; my advice is for the USA. Consult local medical authorities for the situation in your area. Walt
 
"However, there are times when some species of snakes attack without provocation."

This is untrue.
 
Snakes don't attack without provocation. If someone thinks that one did then its because the victim simply doesn't realize what they did to provoke the snake.

One other thing to mention. If you've happened upon a snake and the snake's only route of retreat is the spot you are currently blocking then you need to move away and fast. Almost all animals have the flight or fight response. If they can't fly then they will fight.


My father and I were fishing in a 12' John boat and trolling along a bank fairly slowly. I was in the back and dad was upfront running the trolling motor. As we trolled along both of us spotted a very large cottonmouth swimming towards the shore from out in the river. I said, "Dad, It looks to me like that snake and us are going to get to the same spot at about the same time."

Dad said "No, son. One of us is going to turn."

When hiking or camping an observant person need never have a really close encounter with a snake. Keep your eyes open and you can avoid them. They won't come after you unless you back them into a situation where they have no choice.

[This message has been edited by Mr E Blackadder (edited 06-15-2001).]
 
From personal experience, I've only been attacked 2 times and each time I gave the snake a good excuse. Once I was shooting at a cottonmouth and the other time I was swinging a large stick at a copperhead. If I were the snake, I would have attacked too.

I have also seen several snakes run when given a chance. Let them know you are there and wait until they move. Sometimes they don't move too far - maybe they are territorial??

The greatest danger is stepping on a snake. Be careful when stepping over logs, crossing rocks on a cool but sunny morning, when near rivers, etc. My older brother stepped on a large water snake and fortunately the snake just slipped into the river that was only 2 feet away. I almost stepped on the copperhead that I mentioned before. That's why I was hitting it with a stick - it scared the crap out of me when I almost stepped on it.
 
Golok - I just thought of something else. You said that some snakes attack without provocation. Do you have any really BIG snakes in Malaysia? If so, maybe they do not need provocation because they are just looking for a meal???
 
Golok,

I'm not an expert, but it seems to me the only real answer is prevention. Watch very carefully what's overhead and where you put your feet and avoid lallang and other long grass and reaching into dark places.

Poisonous snakes: You are not going to move faster than a cobra or a krait, especially when they're in a snit because you stepped on their tail. Most times, they just slither off into the grass so keep still till they're gone. The few times a cobra has come into my house, we have persuaded it to crawl into a bucket laid on its side in a corner. Put the bucket upright and it'll stay at the bottom.

Pythons: unless you are in the middle of Taman Negara, you are unlikely to meet a really big one and they aren't as fast as the venomous snakes. However, and not to depress you, I believe even a small one is strong enough to kill by asphyxiation, though it might not be able to swallow you whole. Don't walk alone and make sure each of you has a parang and won't be squeamish about using it when a companion gets a bit ... wrapped up.

Use a walking stick to investigate ahead of you when walking in snake country. Some people bring a dog but if you can't restrain it when it goes nuts on seeing a snake, an attack might be provoked which otherwise wouldn't occur and also the dog will be in danger.

And prepare by reading up on the habits of native snakes in the kind of terrain where you are going to walk and avoiding likely spots.

Good walking.
 
I have heard that some sea snakes will attack humans. It may be a case of their protecting territory. Usually people get bitten by snakes by surprise--the human surprises the snake and the human didn't know it was going to happen.

The likeliest problem scenario is that you have moved into proximity to a snake and it is making warning movements or noises. If the snake is not coiled or bent in a posture that lets it strike I would jump back out of distance before it got itself prepared. If the snake is already tensed and ready I would generally hold still.

If you get bitten by a snake, don't start acting wildly and get bitten multiple times. Most snakes will automatically put enough venom in you to stop their normal prey. This is usually something smaller than a rabbit so the dose usually won't kill a human. One exception to this is a juvenile snake that will just let go with everything he's got.

On the subject of snake speed, the American rattlesnakes are some of the world's fastest. Some people experimented with a mongoose to see if it could handle a rattlesnake, bye-bye mongoose. Cobra's are comparitively slow and that is why they are used by snake charmers. Rattlesnakes are really fast.

By the way Walt, Findley Russell is an old family friend. A few years back when my dad was visiting in Arizona, he took dad out rattlesnake catching (my dad is a retired English professor and was about 74 at the time). Dad was pretty happy that they didn't find any that day.



[This message has been edited by Jeff Clark (edited 06-15-2001).]
 
A while back I was walking in a rice field next to a wall when out of the corner of my eye I saw a movement. I instinctively jumped away sideways and then looked back at the red and white snake recoiling itself after the strike. I was dammed lucky. think the snake was what they here call a "welang" wich is so poiseous that even snake handlers wont "handle" them. It died a quick death after that.
So in my opinion snakes do attack humans , I guess you could say I provoked it by walking by about 60-70 cm away (2 ft) but I didn't even see it before so it certainly wasn't any overt provocation on my part.

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Words only go so far.
Experience is the true teacher.
 
I had the opportunity a couple years back to
have a good conversation with a guy raised in
the Northern Florida & Mississippi area. He
stated that water moccasins/cotton mouths
were indeed territorial. If they sensed some
creature in 'their' space they would go out
and investigate. Whether this could be deemed
as aggressive behavior, I guess would depend
on how the encounter played out? Also he told
of how he and a friend had gone hunting in the swamp (forget what they went after, but it was something small and they had caught
numerous ones) and he had their gamebag slung over one shoulder, where it was partially in the water as they walked. Apparently this put
some blood or scent in the water, because
at one point they looked behind themselves only to see several cotton mouths swimming
along with them as they walked. Needless to say they dropped the gamebag and continued away quickly.

Hey Dr.Walt Welch, I think this next part may
be best fielded by you
smile.gif


I think it was Field&Stream Magazine a number
of years ago that printed an article on the
use of high voltage(60,000-80,000 volts) but
very low amperage electricity to treat venomous snake bites. The whole idea was to
quickly apply the charge to the bitten area so that the positive and negative flow of ions in the shock would scramble the positive and negative ions in the venom (which is usually in the form of an enzyme, right?) rendering it inactive. The magazine stated this had long been a 'folk remedy' for snake bite. This treatment seemed to make some sense. Often thought of carrying a stun gun along just for that purpose. Anyone else
heard of this?

 
I’ve read that people have gotten bit after sticking their hands in places they couldn’t see, and by sitting on or stepping over a log without looking first. Some have been bitten after picking up a snake and handling it until the snake finally had enough and bit the person. I would imagine that a lot of bites fall in this last category.

A friend once told me about walking up behind his wife while she was washing dishes. The next thing he knew he was lying on his back on the floor. He didn’t think he was ‘attacking’ her and she didn’t think she wasn’t ‘attacking’ him, but he still got decked.

I suspect that many snake bites are the same, at least in the USA- the snake, from it’s point of view, was ‘defending’ and not ‘attacking.’ However, some of the exotic critters in other lands may be more aggressive- I just don’t know.

Two links with more than you probably want to know about snakes:

http://www.xmission.com/~gastown/herpmed/med.htm

http://ntri.tamuk.edu/index2.html

Regarding the electric shock (stun gun) method of first aid for snake bite- I read that article years ago. The author visited a doctor who operated a very remote clinic, I think somewhere in South America. The doctor used a stun gun to treat snake bite because no other treatment was available, and had good results. As I remember it, venom is an organic substance, a protein compound I think, and a dose of high voltage electricity breaks the venom down into other, less toxic components. The established medical community strongly discourages this treatment, from what I’ve read.

I did a search on ‘stun gun snake bite’ at google and got lots of hits, if anyone wants to check further into this. Reportedly the stun gun treatment is very effective with insect stings- ants, hornets, bees, etc.

You can carry a walking staff and tap the end on the ground as you walk along. This is supposed to set up vibrations that let the snakes know that you’re coming, and that you are too big to eat. You can also probe clumps of tall grass, etc, with the staff before stepping into them.


 
To the question of King Cobras, yes, we have that in Malaysia. In the jungle, they can sort of sneak up on you. If they do that, that will probably be your last look.

A few years back when I was staying in another town, somewhere near the woods, to be specific, near some hills, some workmen accidentally disturbed a King Cobra's nest.

Fortunately for them, their bulldozer had unintentionally pinned part of the King Cobra to the ground. The very angry snake reared its hood. The workmen were quite alarmed.

They started stoning the King Cobra which didn't had much of a chance anyway. After they had killed it, they laid it on the road at the back of my house.

I went in for a close look. The King Cobra's head was bigger than my foot. King Cobras are known to be as long as 10 feet. The one that died was about nine feet.

If a King Cobra stands up, all ready to attack, it will stare at you at eyeball level. Imagine what it will do for your nerves. King Cobras are brown in colour. Its cousin is the black cobra, smaller and makes a lot of hissing noise when you go near it.

Black cobras are quite fair, they give you a lot of warning sounds. My friend had an encounter with one outside his house, under his car. Initially, he thought he had a leaking pipe because of the loud hissing noise.

Pythons are also common in Malaysia. Last year, a newspaper in my country published a page one picture of a very large python which had half-swallowed a man. That one didn't get away, neither did the man.

Just two days ago, we had another news report of a 20 ft python having eaten a wild boar. And as you all know, wild boar are not small creatures.

Some of the anti-snake venom information is rather interesting. Thanks to my learned colleagues in this forum, I have learned something new. I have not seen a rattlesnake before. Don't intend to meet one soon either.

We have enough problems with our own snakes.


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Make Love your strongest weapon. Compassion your shield and forgiveness your armour.
 
Here in good old Queensland, Australia weve got the the top 9 deadliest snakes in the world, and yes Walt at the right time of the year some of them , particularly Tiapans will attack unprovoked. My little sister has been bitten twice by venomous snakes ( trod on one , sat on the other ). Golok, if you know there are snakes around carry a big stick. I haven't found a species yet that was'nt good eating.

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Steve Filicietti
Custom Knives
AUSTRALIA
http://www.unitedbladeworx.com.au
 
My ladyfriend has a Myotron Checkmate 25,000 stun gun. She said that the instruction book claimed it was an effective treatment for snakebites.
 
After watching several "Wild Kingdom" type TV specials, there are several species in Australia that will aggressively attack humans without provocation, and several are quite fast "runners" on the ground also!

While on manuevers in the US Army in Alabama, I was attacked by 2 cottonmouths without provocation. They are easy to kill if you have a large stick, and, yes, they are quite tasty with the right spices. I didn't, however, go looking for more of them to eat...
 
In 1960 I became 19 years old. I was an Eagle scout, hiking in the beautiful state of West Virginia with two other Eagle scouts. We were in a remote area. It was around noon on our 3rd. or 4th. day into the hike, and I remember it was very hot.

We located a narrow river and decided to bath and swim. I stepped out of the river, placing one foot onto a mud bank and the other into tall, thick green grass. I paid no attention to the ground whatsoever. I leaned to the left to pick up the towel and felt a sharp pain in my right foot. That instant I lifted the righ foot up sinking the Copperhead fangs deeper into foot. The foot came down just as quick and his lower lip was locked to the groung under my toe with the roof of his mouth over my toe. I scared him, he scared me. No question about it...a freak accident on my part. I do not to this day blame the Copperhead snake !! I froze from a state of shock. The snake was trying to let loose and get away. He was twisting, turning and shaking. I lifted my foot again, he escaped and my ordeal began.

In the 1960's, Scouts were trained to cut X's over the wounds, suction the poision out, apply pressure to stop the blood flow "towards the heart," wrap the wound and seek medical attention. We did not take any of those steps. After several days of hard use, our knives were dull (I remember)and no one wanted to make the cut. The small scaple in the snake bite kit was rusted from cutting and skinning frog legs. So I lucked-out...as we know different today.

It took about five hours to get transportation and reach a small-town hospital, where medical attention was administered. Oh my, I got sick. It was not a sickness like the flue or from bad food or from anything you could imagine! I wanted to die...I really wanted them to leave me alone and let me die to escape the misery of dry heaves, pain, high blood pressure, swollen foot, tingling nerves and sweat. I later learned from the doctor that very little of the snake's poision caused my condition. He explained I arrived under his care in a sever state of shock, probably hightened by the belief of the times (1960's) that you WOULD die unless you took the "proper steps" to treat the bite in the field. Now, many years later, I believe what he said is true. How good was the medication in the 60's and how old or new was it in this small rural community? Inmaterial.

I relate my experience for one reason: When they say "stay calm" if bitten by a snake, and if that snake is a Copperhead, it is probably the best field medicine available.
I helped a lady ,many years later,get through a Rattle snake bite. I took her hands, placed them into my plams and held them. I would not let her look away from my eyes. We sat and spoke positive words until the EMS unit arrived. She asked me to follow her to the hospital. Several hours later she was resting comfortably, without visible pain and her facial skin color was "pink". I remember looking at her and later wishing that was me in 1960. Stay calm, if you can.
 
...about the stun guns..
after a venemous snake bites you, you pull out the stun gun and zap yourself?

interesting...
 
The suggestion of carrying a nice long walking stick to probe can work wonders in snake country. If visibility is low (dusk, dawn, or dark), you can sweep back and forth in front of you slowly, while walking forward. The snake is likely to attack your stick, and if you keep it at least three feet in front of your own feet, chances are much better that you'll avoid a bite. No absolute guarantees though!

Knowing the species, habits, habitat, and sign/tracks of the snakes in your region is the first amd most important step in avoiding attacks, though. True for any possible dangerous animals.

Great stuff in this thread!

Best,

Brian.

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Brian Jones
Co-moderator
Wilderness & Survival Skills Forum
 
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