Handling venomous snakes
Clayton Porter seems to have a lot of interactions with snakes, particularly venomous ones. Growing up in the Arizona desert northwest of Tucson, then living in Brown Canyon on the Buenos Aires National Wildlife Refuge with my wife, Roseann, then having our own “homestead” on twenty acres in the Sierrita Mountains next to a million acres of public land, I’ve had more than a few of my own.
When I was a kid, killing rattlesnakes was the accepted response to any sighting, and I clumsily bludgeoned my first one to death when I was eight years old. But within a few years I had adopted a more enlightened and compassionate approach, and the last rattlesnake to meet its end at my hands was during high school, when two friends and I decided, semi-scientifically, to try one roasted. True to the cliché, its firm pale meat did indeed taste rather like chicken. (My friend, the botanist and author Gary Nabhan, is known to reply to waiters who ask how his chicken dish is with, “Great! Tastes just like rattlesnake!”)
Since those early days I’ve relocated uncounted rattlesnakes from the yards of neighbors, and from our own when one showed signs of taking up permanent residence next to the front porch step or under the barbecue. When I first began catching rattlesnakes rather than killing them, I used a succession of rather crude homemade snake sticks to pin their necks so I could securely grab them just behind the head, with a thumb and middle finger on either side and my index finger on top. This was not only fraught with opportunities for screwing up, but was stressful to the snake.
Me on the left here, with an early, homemade snake stick.
Finally I bought a professional snake hook from the now-defunct Furmont company—itself something of a Frankenstein, employing a re-purposed golf club grip and shaft, but also a beautifully machined titanium hook. And I stopped pinning snakes except when absolutely necessary, instead learning how to lift them with the hook—either more or less at the center of gravity, or near the head while grasping the snake near the tail. This method is so much less taxing that many snakes never even rattle.
The hook was a huge improvement; even more so was set of tongs I bought some years later. The jaws of the tongs actually grip the body of the snake, making it far less likely that it will slip out of one’s grasp. My first tongs had a narrow jaw that I decided was not ideal; I felt it put too much stress in a narrow area when the jaws were tight (see opening photo). More recently I bought a set from Midwest Tongs with a wider jaw that is also encased in rubber, which provides a more secure grip with less pressure.
Three hooks, including a collapsible model, and tongs from Midwest Tongs.
I’ve since convinced many friends and acquaintances who have homes in rattlesnake country, and occasionally find the need to relocate one, to buy their own tongs. With tongs and a standard 30-gallon trash can, it’s possible to safely capture and contain any rattlesnake with virtually zero risk.
Wide jaws are easier on the snake.
I have one more kind of snake tool: a set of clear plastic tubes of varying sizes. These are used to safely control the front end and head of a snake while one inspects it . . . or does rude things to the rear end, such as using sexing probes, or surgically inserting a tracking device. The procedure involves selecting a tube just a bit larger than the biggest circumference of the snake, then presenting the end to the coiled snake while gently nudging it with the hook. Once the snake’s head is inside, it generally crawls forward, and once a third or more of it is inside you grab the snake’s body at the rear of the tube, holding both snake and tube so it can’t crawl all the way in.
If you want to learn more about any of these tools, feel free to email me . . . or Clayton.
