Speaker 1: Welcome to This Country Life. I'm your host, Brent Riggs
Speaker 1: from coon hunting to trot lining and just general country living.
Speaker 1: I want you to stay a while as I share
Speaker 1: my stories and the country skills that will help you
Speaker 1: beat the system. This Country Life is proudly presented as
Speaker 1: part of Meat Eater's podcast network, bringing you the best
Speaker 1: outdoor podcast the airways have to offer. All right, friends,
Speaker 1: pull you up a chair or drop that tailgate. I
Speaker 1: think I got a thing or two to teach you snakes.
Speaker 1: I can think a few words that will get your
Speaker 1: attention quicker than someone saying snake. Say it loudly and
Speaker 1: you'll get everyone's attention. Research says that we have an
Speaker 1: ingrained fear of them that is become natural over time.
Speaker 1: And I don't know if I agree one hundred percent
Speaker 1: with that, but I will bet that there's more folks
Speaker 1: that fear them than those of us that don't. And
Speaker 1: if you're in the woods a lot like I am,
Speaker 1: you're gonna see them, and you order to be informed
Speaker 1: about what you're looking at. More importantly, you need to
Speaker 1: be prepared and have a plan in the back of
Speaker 1: your mind for the ones you run up on that
Speaker 1: you don't see. We're talking about snakes this week. But
Speaker 1: first I'm gonna tell you a story. I was in
Speaker 1: high school and probably about sixteen years old, and I
Speaker 1: taken my mama's car to town to knock around with
Speaker 1: my friends on a Sunday afternoon, and on the way home,
Speaker 1: I saw a pretty good rattle snake crossing the road,
Speaker 1: and I decided to catch him and take him home
Speaker 1: to show my mama. Now I don't know why I
Speaker 1: did that, but in the heat of the moment, she
Speaker 1: was the only one I knew that I could show
Speaker 1: the snake to. Everybody else was gone, so I stopped
Speaker 1: her car and I caught him. It wasn't my first
Speaker 1: time ca the venom of snake, not even close. There
Speaker 1: wasn't any kind of snake that was off limits to
Speaker 1: my rounding up skills growing up. I'd catch them all
Speaker 1: and I never had an issue except cotton mouse had
Speaker 1: a bad musky odor that would stink up the world,
Speaker 1: and they did everything they could do to try to
Speaker 1: bite you. But rattlesnakes and copperheads they were easy pickings.
Speaker 1: I got out of the car, I caught him in
Speaker 1: pretty short order. Then I got back in the car
Speaker 1: with a four foot rattlesnake. I got to thinking that
Speaker 1: if he got loose in there, it's going to be
Speaker 1: a chore to get him out, and my mama would
Speaker 1: kill me. So driving down the road, I swapped hands
Speaker 1: from right to left, dragging that snake across my lap,
Speaker 1: and I hung him out the window for the mile
Speaker 1: ride to the house. I pulled up and went and
Speaker 1: knocked on the door, and I hollered for Mama to
Speaker 1: come see what I'd got. She opened the door, and
Speaker 1: I was holding that snake with both hands, one on
Speaker 1: his head and the other on his tail, so she
Speaker 1: couldn't see him wiggling. And when she said, oh Lord,
Speaker 1: where did you kill that thing? I dropped him on
Speaker 1: the car port and he bawled up and went to
Speaker 1: buzzing like somebody had kicked over a beehive. I said,
Speaker 1: he ain't dead. She squealed and came on glued and
Speaker 1: started swinging the room at me. I kept the snake
Speaker 1: in between me and her in case she charged, but
Speaker 1: she was on the steps going into the house. It
Speaker 1: wasn't about to come down to the level where me
Speaker 1: and the snake were. She made it clear that I
Speaker 1: was to terminate that snake with extreme prejudice, and that
Speaker 1: if she ever caught me messing with poisonous snakes again,
Speaker 1: that she'd save the snake the trouble and killed me herself.
Speaker 1: Three years later, and an untold number of snakes caught
Speaker 1: and released, most that she didn't know about. Wayne Parnell
Speaker 1: and I were driving home from my brother Tim's house
Speaker 1: when we saw the largest copperhead in the history of
Speaker 1: mankind crossing the road in front of us. We're setting
Speaker 1: the stage for buffoonery, y'all pay attention. Sliding to a stop,
Speaker 1: I got out of the truck to catch him. I
Speaker 1: didn't even have to tell Wayne to stop. He knew
Speaker 1: what was fixing to happen. And Wayne was a good
Speaker 1: coach and a cheerleader as he stood safely behind his truck,
Speaker 1: urging me on in the capture of that serpent. Not
Speaker 1: unlike Marlon Perkins to gym on Wild Kingdom. The snake
Speaker 1: called into his defensive position and I was moving in
Speaker 1: to catch him. I remember exactly what I was wearing. Anybody,
Speaker 1: I won't take a guess, bingo overalls and red high
Speaker 1: top converse tennis shoes. You probably didn't guess that, but
Speaker 1: that's what I was wearing anyway. I eased my foot
Speaker 1: up to a spot right behind that joker's head and
Speaker 1: slightly applied pressure. I could feel his body pin into
Speaker 1: the gravel road, and I reached down to grab him
Speaker 1: behind his head, and the most amazing thing happened. As
Speaker 1: it turned out, I was standing on a small rock
Speaker 1: and not the snake. The snake opened up his mouth,
Speaker 1: wrapped his little lips around my favorite thumb on my
Speaker 1: left hand, and stuck one of his fangs into the
Speaker 1: knuckle joint of the previously mentioned thumb, and to what
Speaker 1: must have been six and a half gallons of venom
Speaker 1: into my now astonished, yet a recently more educated person.
Speaker 1: I pulled my hand back and jumped away from that
Speaker 1: snake in disbelief, and I said, Wayne, he bit me.
Speaker 1: No he didn't, Yes, he did. Look it's bleeding. You're
Speaker 1: gonna die. No I'm not, but that snake is Forget
Speaker 1: the snake. We gotta get to the doctor. Get in
Speaker 1: the truck. You're gonna die. There's nothing like encouragement in
Speaker 1: the face of adversity. Wayne is driving like a wild man,
Speaker 1: and my thumb is starting to swell. I could see
Speaker 1: it swelling, but I was calm during the whole ordeal.
Speaker 1: I was holding my left thumb with my right hand
Speaker 1: and squeezing it as hard as I could to help
Speaker 1: stop the flow of venom. I wasn't afraid of snakes,
Speaker 1: and my doctor told me that not getting upset was
Speaker 1: probably more beneficial to me as anything. The ride to
Speaker 1: town didn't take very long, but I had to take
Speaker 1: off my watch after a few minutes because of the swelling.
Speaker 1: Wayne and I had pulled up to a red light.
Speaker 1: Sitting in the lame beside us was a deputy sheriff
Speaker 1: that both of us knew. I rolled down my window
Speaker 1: and I asked him to contact the hospital and tell
Speaker 1: them that we were on the way and what had happened.
Speaker 1: He got on the radio and told us to follow him,
Speaker 1: and he gave us a police escort all the way
Speaker 1: across town. They were waiting for me when we arrived
Speaker 1: at the emergency room a few minutes later. The snake
Speaker 1: had bit me probably fifteen minutes ago, and my hand
Speaker 1: was now almost twice the normal size. They stuck my
Speaker 1: hand down in a big garbage bag of ice and
Speaker 1: asked how I had gotten bit. And that's when I
Speaker 1: realized somebody was going to write this down and my
Speaker 1: mama was going to read it. I may have been
Speaker 1: dang near grown, but if she decided to give me
Speaker 1: a whooping for playing with venomous snakes, I was just
Speaker 1: gonna have to take it. I didn't want a whooping
Speaker 1: they hurt. A plan starts to materialize in my criminally
Speaker 1: clever mind, a story so unbelievable that they would have
Speaker 1: no choice to believe it. At that time, I was
Speaker 1: a bona fide member of the School Brothers Union and
Speaker 1: I chewed tobacco. I have it associated with having to
Speaker 1: spit tobacco juice into some type of receptacle, and I
Speaker 1: referred to those as a spit cup. And this is
Speaker 1: common knowledge where I come from. So I swing my
Speaker 1: plan into action. Doctor Chambers, Wayne and I were going
Speaker 1: down the road and I needed a spit cup. He
Speaker 1: pulled over on the side of the road and I
Speaker 1: got out. I reached down for the cup lying there,
Speaker 1: and the snake bit me. I never saw him until
Speaker 1: he bit me. The r had been one of chaos,
Speaker 1: with folks calling out procedures and this and that, and
Speaker 1: it was like a scene out of a movie, everyone dodging,
Speaker 1: dashing around in medically orchestration. And as soon as I
Speaker 1: said that, a hush fell over the crowd. Everyone stopped
Speaker 1: and looked at me like I just walked into a
Speaker 1: saloon where my wonted poster was hanging. Doctor David Chambers
Speaker 1: was my doctor and just happened to be there making
Speaker 1: rounds when the call came in from the deputy sheriff.
Speaker 1: I'm from a small town, like y'all know. He knew me, well,
Speaker 1: he knew my mama. He stopped what he was doing
Speaker 1: and he looked at me and said, you're kidding me.
Speaker 1: I said, no, sir, that's what happened. Now. I'm sure
Speaker 1: you're probably saying to yourself, why is this idiot lying
Speaker 1: about how you got bit? This excuse is worse than
Speaker 1: the truth. Well, you don't know my mama. The incident
Speaker 1: involved in the rattlesnake was the last time she chewed
Speaker 1: me out for playing with snakes. There had been countless others.
Speaker 1: I don't think anyone was buying the spits cup excuse,
Speaker 1: but it didn't matter. I just needed my mama to
Speaker 1: buy it. Now she had to be told him. Since
Speaker 1: I was busy getting tended to. I told Wayne to
Speaker 1: do it. Wayne didn't want it do it. He had
Speaker 1: been a good friend for the majority of my life
Speaker 1: and still is growing up. He was figuratively a member
Speaker 1: of my family. That meant that also that he had
Speaker 1: no immunity when it came time for Mama to dish
Speaker 1: out the whoopings of fact, he was well aware of.
Speaker 1: I don't want to call her. She'll kill me too.
Speaker 1: Come on, Wayne, somebody's got to call her and get
Speaker 1: her up here. Mama later told me that the phone
Speaker 1: call went like this. Mama said, hello, miss Betty, Yes,
Speaker 1: this is Wayne. Hi Wayne, We're at the hospital. Oh
Speaker 1: my god, what happened? Where's Brent? He's right here, he's
Speaker 1: all right. Well, why are you at the hospital? Well
Speaker 1: he uh uh, Brent kind of got snake bid. Brent
Speaker 1: kind of got what snake bid. He's all right. They're
Speaker 1: giving him some Hello. Hello, Mama was on her way.
Speaker 1: Wayne stuck his head in the room and told me
Speaker 1: he thought she was on her way and that she
Speaker 1: seemed a little bit upset. Wayne disappeared, only to resurface
Speaker 1: about the time Mama would walk in the door. Doctor
Speaker 1: Chambers told me that it was a possibility that I
Speaker 1: could lose my thumb. I asked him if i'd still
Speaker 1: be able to shoot a shotgun. He said, well yes,
Speaker 1: and I said, well cut it off. I don't care.
Speaker 1: He laughed and said there would be no amputations that day,
Speaker 1: and he didn't think it would come to that, but
Speaker 1: it was just a possibility. You're not real smart when
Speaker 1: you're nineteen. I would have really missed that thumb during
Speaker 1: all these years. I remember one of the nurses taking
Speaker 1: my blood pressure three times in a row. She told
Speaker 1: the doctor that something was wrong with the blood pressure
Speaker 1: cuff and they got another one. She said, there's something
Speaker 1: wrong with this one too, because my blood pressure was
Speaker 1: reading normal well. Doctor Chambers asked me if I was scared,
Speaker 1: and I told him no, sir, and that was the truth.
Speaker 1: I never got the least bit scared or nervous. I
Speaker 1: didn't have enough sense to Doctor Chambers told her that
Speaker 1: there was nothing wrong with the blood pressure cuff. I
Speaker 1: was calm and that was the reason for the normal
Speaker 1: reading that was all about to change. In Walkwayne eating
Speaker 1: a snicker bar and drinking a coke. He was grinning,
Speaker 1: just checking out everything that was going on. Then Mama
Speaker 1: rounded the corner of the door like she was running
Speaker 1: a search. One on the er. Wayne more Or lesstood
Speaker 1: an attention and said, high, miss Betty, I'll deal with
Speaker 1: you in a minute, was what she said back. This
Speaker 1: has not started out well, Mama. I wasn't trying to
Speaker 1: catch it, I promise. I was leaning down to get
Speaker 1: a spit cup off the side of the road, and
Speaker 1: the snake bit me all right out here on the thumb.
Speaker 1: It sounded even dumber the second time I said it,
Speaker 1: and she just looked at me. I could feel every
Speaker 1: eyeball in there going back and forth from her to me,
Speaker 1: like that scene in The Good and the Bad and
Speaker 1: the Ugly when Clint Eastwood leave, Van Cleef and Eli
Speaker 1: Wallach were giving each other the stink eye waiting for
Speaker 1: so I wanted to make the first move, draw their
Speaker 1: pistols and commenced to shooting. Watch that movie and you'll
Speaker 1: get a sense of what the tension was in that
Speaker 1: room is Everyone waited to see what she was going
Speaker 1: to use to kill me with. After she made sure
Speaker 1: I was going to live, she walked over to the
Speaker 1: exam table and said, I told you that stuff was
Speaker 1: going to kill you. I should have just went with
Speaker 1: the truth. I was going to be wrong either way.
Speaker 1: Doctor Chambers and the rest got a pretty good laugh
Speaker 1: out of that, but I wasn't about to laugh. I
Speaker 1: knew I was in for it. Eventually, the new would
Speaker 1: rub off that story, The exposed holes would be exploited
Speaker 1: by my brothers to my mother, and they would sit
Speaker 1: back and gleefully watch as she tortured me. It all
Speaker 1: eventually came to pass, and I was none the worse
Speaker 1: for wear. I spent three days in the hospital. I
Speaker 1: never got sick, and I still sport a scar on
Speaker 1: the favorite thumb of my left hand. There was talk
Speaker 1: of having to do surgery to keep my skin from
Speaker 1: tearing because it had gotten so big. But at the
Speaker 1: last minute, and right before they started getting the operating
Speaker 1: room ready, the swelling started going down. That snake was
Speaker 1: one of a jillion that I had caught in my youth,
Speaker 1: and the last live venom of snake I have ever touched.
Speaker 1: If I had listened to my mama, I wouldn't have
Speaker 1: gotten bit that day. If I had listened to my mama,
Speaker 1: I wouldn't have done a lot of things that I
Speaker 1: later got in trouble, for if I had listened to
Speaker 1: my mama, I wouldn't be talking to you now. She
Speaker 1: told me that hunting, fishing and running my mouth about
Speaker 1: it wouldn't get me anywhere. Hey mama, what's the name
Speaker 1: of your podcast? Is she going to kill me for
Speaker 1: that one? And that's just how that happened. September is
Speaker 1: a busy time in Arkansas and in other parts of
Speaker 1: the country as well. Leaves are starting to turn loose,
Speaker 1: elk or bugling bears are fattening it up prepping for
Speaker 1: the winter. White tails have lost the velvet off their antlers,
Speaker 1: and the creepy crawleys are at the peak of their activity.
Speaker 1: And of all those majestic creatures and activities I just mentioned,
Speaker 1: we're going to talk about snakes. First of all, we
Speaker 1: have six venomous snakes in Arkansas. The Eastern Copperhead, that
Speaker 1: that one that we just talked about, Then there's the
Speaker 1: Northern cotton Mouth. It's been my experience as these jokers
Speaker 1: have the worst disposition of any of them. Allow me
Speaker 1: to elaborate. Back in the eighties, it was in April
Speaker 1: and the opening morning and turkey season, and I was
Speaker 1: so fired up to go that when I stepped out
Speaker 1: of my truck to walk down into the bottoms where
Speaker 1: I was going to listen, I was about two hours early.
Speaker 1: It was way before daylight, and the only life I
Speaker 1: had with me was a little pen light that was
Speaker 1: so dim he dang there. Had to strike a match
Speaker 1: beside it to see if it was on. I stuck
Speaker 1: it back in my pocket, but I couldn't set it
Speaker 1: the truck. I had to go, so, taking my time
Speaker 1: because I had plenty of it, I made my way
Speaker 1: slowly down through the woods in the dark, navigating by
Speaker 1: a sliver of moonlight and just using my face as
Speaker 1: a limb detector. It was a very effective but somewhat
Speaker 1: painful way to find out where the limbs were. But
Speaker 1: I'd made that trip a million times before and I
Speaker 1: knew the way, so I knew that if I could
Speaker 1: just keep from jobbing both of my eyes out or
Speaker 1: ripping the ears off the side of my head, that
Speaker 1: when I got close to steep Bank Creek and heard
Speaker 1: the water running over the shallow gravel crossing, that I'd
Speaker 1: just wait there until goblin time came in the dark. Eventually,
Speaker 1: but not without a few stumbles and abrasions. I heard
Speaker 1: water running through that show where I'd planned to listen from,
Speaker 1: and I stopped in a small opening in the trees.
Speaker 1: I dug around for that little pen light, and when
Speaker 1: I did, I found an extra battery. I loaded that
Speaker 1: rascal and fired it up, and it was like I
Speaker 1: had harnessed the power of the sun. After my eyes
Speaker 1: had gotten so acclimated the darkness and tree bark, I
Speaker 1: also realized that the creek was louder than I had
Speaker 1: originally thought it would be, so I was going to
Speaker 1: have to relocate a little ways away from it when
Speaker 1: gobling time came, so I wouldn't miss a far away gobble.
Speaker 1: Because of that record, I knew that I had over
Speaker 1: an hour before I needed to move, so I turned
Speaker 1: on my light and I looked toward that creek that
Speaker 1: was fifteen yards away. The creek was about ten feet wide,
Speaker 1: and laying on the opposite bank from where I was
Speaker 1: looking was a big cotton mouth. He was cooled up
Speaker 1: and striking into the riffles of the water. It was weird,
Speaker 1: and I ain't never seen that before. So I took
Speaker 1: a couple of steps closer, and I saw that there
Speaker 1: was a bunch of little brim going through that shoal,
Speaker 1: and he was trying to catch him one. I bet
Speaker 1: I washed him, striking four or five fish and didn't
Speaker 1: catch a one. I grew weary of watching him strike out.
Speaker 1: It was like watching all the out takes on National
Speaker 1: Geographic when of them palace get away from the cheetah.
Speaker 1: I want to see something get in time to change
Speaker 1: the channel. I turned my light off and went back
Speaker 1: to stating in the dark, looking at the stars, minding
Speaker 1: my own business and waiting on daylight. I never gave
Speaker 1: him another thought, for I don't know it must have
Speaker 1: been ten fifteen minutes. Fella can only do so much
Speaker 1: in the dark past the time, so I decided to
Speaker 1: turn my little light back home to see what was
Speaker 1: happening on the snake channel. I shined my light over
Speaker 1: thereby Elvis had left the building. The little fish were
Speaker 1: still shooting through the rabbits, but the cotton mouth he
Speaker 1: was nowhere to be seen. I was a little disappointed
Speaker 1: that I hadn't kept watching him, because he'd obviously caught
Speaker 1: one and took off. That had been pretty cool to see.
Speaker 1: I shined left and right up and down the bank,
Speaker 1: looking for him, but I didn't seem And then, for
Speaker 1: some unknown reasoned that pen light at my feet. In
Speaker 1: less than a foot away from me was that cotton mouth,
Speaker 1: all cold up with his mouth wide open. He looked
Speaker 1: like he weighed ninety two pounds and his mouth was
Speaker 1: big enough to swallow us. Sit in here and her nest.
Speaker 1: I don't know how high I jumped or how high
Speaker 1: I squealed, but both of them were way up there,
Speaker 1: and when I came down, I monkey stomped that joker
Speaker 1: all over that little clear and until he didn't favor
Speaker 1: a drink of water. I don't know why he came
Speaker 1: to where I was, but he did. I've had them
Speaker 1: come to where I was before, when I was frog
Speaker 1: gigging or running the trout line at night with a spotlight. Regardless,
Speaker 1: they deserved some respect in space, and apparently I'd failed
Speaker 1: to one or both of them. Now, doing some research
Speaker 1: for this episode, I kept reading where contrary to what
Speaker 1: I just said, cotton mouths aren't overly aggressive. Well, okay,
Speaker 1: mister snake expert, maybe they're just really curious and like
Speaker 1: to show off their fans. Where's doctor Chris Jenkins when
Speaker 1: I need him? Speaking? To him. He's got a podcast
Speaker 1: called Snake Talk, and if snakes are your thing, it's
Speaker 1: very informative and you should check it out now. In
Speaker 1: all seriousness, that snake was between two and twelve feet long.
Speaker 1: Not really, he was about two and a half feet long.
Speaker 1: I don't think he was attacking me because he had
Speaker 1: every opportunity to bite me before I ever turned my
Speaker 1: light on looking for him. And there's no telling how
Speaker 1: long he'd been there. Either he was just going my
Speaker 1: way or was defending his fishing on who knows. He
Speaker 1: only did three things wrong. He scared me down near
Speaker 1: to death, violated the perimeter of my personal space, and
Speaker 1: he didn't wear a helmet, all of which were not
Speaker 1: my phone. All right, that's two of them, cotton mouse
Speaker 1: and copperheads. We still got three kinds of rattlesnakes. That's
Speaker 1: Western diamondbacks, timber rattlesnakes, and pigmy rattlesnakes. That's the little fellow.
Speaker 1: Not sure if I've ever even seen a diamondback, but
Speaker 1: I've seen a box car load of timber rattlers. They
Speaker 1: were very prevalent where I grew up. But I've never
Speaker 1: had a bad experience with rattlesnakes. I'd run up on
Speaker 1: them in the woods and could count on probably one
Speaker 1: hand how many times I've ever heard them rattle before
Speaker 1: I saw him. I don't go around looking for them,
Speaker 1: but when I'm in places where they like to be,
Speaker 1: I guess I'm subconsciously more observant. Diamondbacks are over in
Speaker 1: the western in the southwestern corner of Arkansas, and I
Speaker 1: just wasn't in my stomping grounds. Had a fellow in
Speaker 1: the neighborhood knock on my door one day. It was
Speaker 1: September in twoenty and nineteen. When I answered the door,
Speaker 1: I recognized him from seeing him drive by the house,
Speaker 1: but I'd never talked to him before, knew which house
Speaker 1: he lived in. I opened the door, and the first
Speaker 1: thing out of his mouth was do you have a gun? Well?
Speaker 1: That got my spidy senses tingling, and I took a
Speaker 1: step closer to him and quickly looked to see if
Speaker 1: he had one in his hands or on his person.
Speaker 1: Satisfied he didn't, and that I was now close enough
Speaker 1: to throw punch him off my porch if I needed to,
Speaker 1: I said, do I need one? That's when he told
Speaker 1: me about the big rattlesnake. He'd seen him a driveway.
Speaker 1: You sure it was a rattlesnake. Oh yeah, he's a
Speaker 1: big one. Well, I figured he saw a snake, but
Speaker 1: I doubted he'd seen a rattlesnake. I'd been here for
Speaker 1: nine years and ain't never seen one. So I followed
Speaker 1: him outside to look at the snake and was about
Speaker 1: to give him a lesson on snake id. I didn't
Speaker 1: bother bringing a gun when we walked him. When we
Speaker 1: walked to the mailbox, he pointed it to nearly five
Speaker 1: foot rattlesnake coled up behind it. I retreated for the
Speaker 1: twenty two You can check my Instagram and see the
Speaker 1: picture of him the snake, not the neighbor. Now, I
Speaker 1: want to say, for the record, I ain't bad about
Speaker 1: killing snakes. They serve a purpose, and he was just
Speaker 1: out making a living. Anything whose diet has rats in
Speaker 1: it is my friend, because I give no quarter to rats. Also,
Speaker 1: for the record, there's no difference in my mind when
Speaker 1: it comes to rats and mice. Rats or rats and
Speaker 1: mice are small rats. But he can't make a living
Speaker 1: in my yard when I got kids and grandkids running around.
Speaker 1: Life is hard it's harder if you're a rattlesnake and
Speaker 1: you trespass at Brent's house, a king snake or any
Speaker 1: other non venomous snake would have got a free pass anyway,
Speaker 1: That pigmy rattlesnake is as common as crickets. And lastly
Speaker 1: there's the Texas coral snake, of which I have only
Speaker 1: seen one in my lifetime. So by sheer law of
Speaker 1: averages and in my experience in Arkansas and in similar environments,
Speaker 1: if you come across a venom of snake, you're gonna
Speaker 1: be bumping into copperheads, cotton mouths, and timber rattlers more
Speaker 1: than any other. Like when I got bit, you seek
Speaker 1: medical attention at once, But what about your dog? When
Speaker 1: I'm coon hunting, I'm purposely sending Whaling down creek and
Speaker 1: slew edges where the bandidos roam, but also overlaps where
Speaker 1: the snakes live and operate too. It's bound to happen
Speaker 1: at some juncture, and when it does, you may not
Speaker 1: notice the effects immediately. First thing I do when I
Speaker 1: call Whaling in to go home is give him a
Speaker 1: good inspection before I load him up. When I've got
Speaker 1: him on the tailgate and removing his track and collar.
Speaker 1: I'm inspecting him for any damages he may have incurred
Speaker 1: while out hunting. When I get him home to unload
Speaker 1: him and put him up, I do the same thing
Speaker 1: again on the tailgate from his grill to his exhaust pipe.
Speaker 1: I'm looking him over and first thing. The next morning,
Speaker 1: when I go out to feed him, I do the
Speaker 1: same thing again. If I see some swelling, that's when
Speaker 1: I start my diagnosis. Me and Rex were hunting Whaling
Speaker 1: and his dog Shadow one night and they were blowing
Speaker 1: a coon track up in a big hardwood flat in
Speaker 1: the Cache River bottoms. Walking to where they were treed,
Speaker 1: we heard Shadow yep like he had something had hurt him,
Speaker 1: and then he went back to tree. Rex asked me
Speaker 1: if I heard that, and the one I said yes,
Speaker 1: he said, I think Shadow just got snake bit. We
Speaker 1: went on into the tree and they'd split tree at
Speaker 1: about thirty yards apart, and both of them had a coon.
Speaker 1: It was August and Primo Cottonmouth Country. We checked him
Speaker 1: over and we didn't see any issues. But the next
Speaker 1: morning Rex called me and said, well, it looks like
Speaker 1: Shadow got bit. His right front foot is about twice
Speaker 1: the size as it should be. He sent me a
Speaker 1: picture of it. It looked like he's wearing a boxing
Speaker 1: glove on it. Long story short, it wasn't a snake
Speaker 1: bite at all. It was a thorn off a black
Speaker 1: locust tree that he'd stepped on. And let me tell you,
Speaker 1: those things hurt. The thorns of the Robenia suiticacia commonly
Speaker 1: called the black locust tree or toxic and can call
Speaker 1: swelling and the cross which is tissue death a saw
Speaker 1: that won't heal. The vet couldn't find anything punctures, so
Speaker 1: he make sure hed his foot to see if he'd
Speaker 1: broken it, and found the thorn, and then he removed it.
Speaker 1: A few days of antibiotics and Shadow was ready to
Speaker 1: hunt again. So, if you have a dog that gets
Speaker 1: bitten by a venomous snake, and you're fortunate enough to
Speaker 1: know what kind it is, that's gonna dictate what your
Speaker 1: next steps are. I call my good friend and serial
Speaker 1: duck killer doctor Jonathan Bradshaw, DVM, the Sporting Dog Veterinarian.
Speaker 1: If y'all ain't following him on Instagram, you are to be.
Speaker 1: He's like a mild mannered Clark Kent going about his
Speaker 1: day to life in the city limits of Dogopolis until
Speaker 1: there's a need for heroics, and as quick as a hiccup,
Speaker 1: he's in a phone booth, putting on his cape and
Speaker 1: flying off to save the day. For real, He's always
Speaker 1: posting stuff on there about health care for you dogs
Speaker 1: that you'd normally have to pay for. Anyway, I hemmed
Speaker 1: him up and posed this question to him. First of all,
Speaker 1: here's the disclaimer. Good lord, the times that we live in, y'all,
Speaker 1: don't be jamming me of the dock up in the
Speaker 1: future saying y'all's device killed my dog. Well, ain't nobody
Speaker 1: got time for that. If you're concerned about your dog's health,
Speaker 1: told him to the vet. End the disclaimer. Now here's
Speaker 1: the question and his answer, Doc, do you have a
Speaker 1: general rule about treating snake bites and dogs? If it's
Speaker 1: a big dog and a little snake, do nothing? Or
Speaker 1: a little dog and a big snake do you seek
Speaker 1: treatment to me? Here's where snake idea comes in. It's
Speaker 1: very important to know the difference. Both cotton mouth and
Speaker 1: rattlesnake venoms are hematoxic and cast circulatory system and muscle
Speaker 1: tissue damage, including the crosis, but the rattlesnake venom is
Speaker 1: much more potent than the cotton mouth Enough rambling, Brent,
Speaker 1: What did the guy who knows sake? This is what
Speaker 1: he said, Unless it's a rattlesnake, I don't really worry
Speaker 1: about it. Benadrill is nice to give. Steroids are nice
Speaker 1: to give, but antibiotics sometimes really saved the day a
Speaker 1: few days down the road when infection from the bite
Speaker 1: sets in or sluggish blood flow settles in. Here's what
Speaker 1: he said about rattlesnakes. If it's a rattlesnake, any venom
Speaker 1: and extreme supportive care period. Now there's going to be
Speaker 1: somebody send me a message saying you don't need no
Speaker 1: vent to treat a snake bite. My dog got bit
Speaker 1: by a sixteen foot rattlesnake and we didn't do nothing
Speaker 1: and he was all right. Well, y'all also don't need
Speaker 1: a spoon to eat soup with, but it sure makes
Speaker 1: it less messy when you use one. Please don't send
Speaker 1: me that message or a picture of you eating soup
Speaker 1: without a spoon. Knowing the environment you're hunting in and
Speaker 1: what venom of snakes most likely in habit the area,
Speaker 1: will help you determine what level of care you give me.
Speaker 1: I'm going to err on the side of caution every
Speaker 1: time you you do what you want. Snakes are part
Speaker 1: of the landscape, and the struggle to coexists with the
Speaker 1: humanity started when that joker talked to even to taking
Speaker 1: a bite out of that apple. Dang girl, what was
Speaker 1: you thinking? Now? That was the first incident when a
Speaker 1: serpent caused havoc on the planet. But Eve made that choice.
Speaker 1: The snake didn't make her eat it. Fast forward to
Speaker 1: when I was nineteen and not more or less him
Speaker 1: the copper head up so I could stick my thumb
Speaker 1: in his mouth. He didn't make me do that. It
Speaker 1: was my choice, And like that old dude set in
Speaker 1: that cave on Indiana Jones, I chose poorly. A high
Speaker 1: percentage of snake bites a curve when we're messing with him.
Speaker 1: If you leave them alone, they're more liable to leave
Speaker 1: you alone. One more story about snakes and dogs. My
Speaker 1: brother Tim had a black lab that I've talked about
Speaker 1: on here before. His name was Zach and he was
Speaker 1: quite a dog. I loved that rascal. Everyone loved him
Speaker 1: and he loved everyone. But he hated snakes, and this
Speaker 1: was no entry level hate either. This dude was a
Speaker 1: Tier one snake hater. He hated them so much, especially rattlesnakes,
Speaker 1: that he would dig them up either the den, kill them,
Speaker 1: and bring them to my brother's porch and offer them
Speaker 1: up as a testimony of his hatred for old Jake
Speaker 1: no shoulders. He wasn't alone in this endeavor either. He
Speaker 1: had an accomplice, a half Boston Terrier and half Blue
Speaker 1: Healer named Fred. Don't even ask how that cross came about.
Speaker 1: Zach was laid back in about the coolest dog you
Speaker 1: have ever seen. His expressions reminded me of Eore on
Speaker 1: Winnie the Pooh. That dude was the epitome of chill.
Speaker 1: Fred was not. Fred was a hot wire And I'm
Speaker 1: not sure if Fred was nervous or if he was
Speaker 1: just really quick. But my brother is a gunsmith, and
Speaker 1: on top of repairing guns and test firing them, we
Speaker 1: would shoot skeet and everything else around there. We was
Speaker 1: always shooting at something whenever Zach and Fred were around.
Speaker 1: Every time time someone pulled the trigger and fired a shot,
Speaker 1: for ever to body Zack right in the rear end.
Speaker 1: Only Zack and nobody knew what. But back to the snakes.
Speaker 1: Tim told me it was a common occurrence to hear
Speaker 1: something on the porch and open the door to see
Speaker 1: Zach and Fred standing there, Zack holding a dead rattlesnake
Speaker 1: in his mouth, and he and Fred both looking like
Speaker 1: they just survived five rounds with Mike Tyson. Tim said,
Speaker 1: at first, as Zack said, it would look like a basketball,
Speaker 1: but eventually, after years of Zach's campaign against snakes, that
Speaker 1: the swelling wouldn't amount to much at all. It's pretty
Speaker 1: crazy when you think about it. Now. Did he build
Speaker 1: up a tolerance to the venom? He sure didn't build
Speaker 1: up a tolerance to their presence. Zach lived a long time,
Speaker 1: but I don't remember what happened to Fred. He probably
Speaker 1: wound up in the nervous hospital. He was definitely a
Speaker 1: good prospect for it. Anyway, Snakes are your challenged this week.
Speaker 1: Do some paperwork and learn about the snakes in your
Speaker 1: area and have a plan on what to do if
Speaker 1: you or your dog gets bitten. I see people on
Speaker 1: social media saying that the only good snake is a
Speaker 1: dead snake. Well that ain't true. They serve a purpose
Speaker 1: and they have a place. It's usually the best when
Speaker 1: that place is over yonder, but they do have a place.
Speaker 1: Be alert when you head to the mailbox. You never
Speaker 1: know I might be lurking there. This is Brent Reeves
Speaker 1: signing off. Y'all be careful.