Copperhead Snakes: A Real Threat

Until recently, I haven't had much experience with poisonous snakes. I've hiked through many wooded areas searching for geocaches and exploring without incident.

Two months ago, my neighbor was enjoying an after dinner walk with 5 other people and a dog. As they entered the driveway from the street, she stepped on a copperhead snake. "It looked like a small pile of leaves," her daughter reported. Before anyone realized the danger, she had been bit on the ankle.

The snake escaped and the family whisked the victim to the nearest emergency room. Swelling began immediately with pain and nausea.

Strangely enough, this emergency room had 4 other copperhead bites that day. It makes it more alarming that this emergency room is a small hospital annex serving residents in a residential community of a larger city.

As reported by the neighbor, the pain from a copperhead bite is severe. She was given morphine and, fortunately, moved to the head of the emergency room "line." She was monitored closely for many hours to gauge the severity of venom exposure (called envenomation). This determination is used to decide if antivenom will be administered or not. The administration of antivenom has an array of side effects that may require hospitalization as well as other complications.

Later, we learned several things NOT to do for a copperhead snake bite victim:

• Do not apply ice
• Do not apply a tourniquet
• Do not cut the bite and try to suck out the poison
• Do not use a pump suction device
• Do not administer any medication unless advised by a doctor

My neighbor took about 6 weeks to feel "normal" again. For 2 weeks she was unable to walk on the foot. She continued to feel severe pain for 3 weeks. Meanwhile, the whole neighborhood was on alert for these snakes.

Last Saturday, I was going in and out of our attached garage completing various chores. Each time I went out, I closed the door so leaves wouldn't blow in. On one trip out, I caught sight of a copperhead snake coming into the garage.

It seemed we spotted each other simultaneously. He started to climb up the garage entrance while I grabbed a rake to try to keep him from entering. Our garage is very cluttered, and there were too many hiding places for a snake.

He was too quick for me, and crawled under beach umbrellas and chairs piled in the corner. I took a safe position 10 feet from him inside the garage [armed with a rake] to make sure he remained in the corner. He was hidden, but I maintained my position until my husband came home from work.

We carefully and systematically fished our gear out of that corner until we could see the snake with a flashlight. Of course it was coiled up ready to strike.

We were able to dispatch the snake without anyone getting bit, but that experience was too close for comfort.



NC State Cooperative Extension has a nice write-up on copperhead snakes.