Northern Copperhead Bite

Northern Copperhead Bite
My Experience
by
Leo Spinner

It was the end of June 2008 and I had three of my boys age 12, 13 and 15 down visiting from Cape-Cod, Mass., for a snake hunt in North Eastern Pennsylvania. It was early morning about 8:30 a.m., and it had rained the night before. The weather was overcast with temps in the mid-eighties. It was perfect weather to herp.

We had arrived at one of my sure thing spots on the side of a mountain, alongside railroad tracks and within ten minutes we were to have already found several snakes. The excitement of the day began when only a couple of minutes from the car Morgan spotted an adult male Eastern Hognose lying right out in the open on the gravel with which the tracks lay upon.

Moments later our day rolled into two Northern Copperheads, an adult Eastern Garter Snake, a gravid Five Lined Skink, an adult female Black Ratsnake which was clearly gravid and a beautiful adult Timber Rattlesnake, as predicted. This was proving to be a perfect day in the field.

A few yards up the track my son Mario alerts the rest of us that he has found another Copperhead peering from beneath a large flat rock which lay against a mound of coal dust.

Well versed in snake hunting at such an early age, Mario knew not to disturb the snake or create much activity in the area until the rest of us arrived at the location.

With a philosophy that all things are an educational experience, we spoke as a group and worked out the best plan of action to make the most out of the find. We all looked carefully around the edges of this rock to be sure there were no other snakes resting just out of view which may put one of us in danger. I decided to gently lift the rock backwards while 15 year old Leo carefully manipulated the snake into the open. Mario and Morgan placed themselves strategically in the event that the snake were to decide to make a quick break in one direction or another.

As I lifted the rock I exposed the gorgeous and rather large at 2 1/2 feet bright orange Northern Copperhead. Its colors seemed so intense against the black coal dust which was all around. At first the gravid female snake lay still, obviously taken by surprise by her sudden exposure to the daylight. Leo proceeded to gently hook her and pull her away from the rock. The second that hook touched her body, the snake was off like lightning in a direction which was uncovered by any of us!

Still holding this large rock back with my left hand, I instinctively and wrecklessly (Yep, I admit it) reached down and grabbed the Copperhead by the tip of the tail in an effort to just pull it back enough for Leo to move in and hook it. I believe in the same moment that I reached for her tail, she had decided to change direction and her mouth was instantly wrapped around my finger. I then recieved two fangs into my knuckle and a full envenomation. It was instant and intense pain, not unlike that of a wasp sting.

She didn't bite and release; she had bitten and held on long enough for me to lift her from the ground. I'm not sure if maybe the area she made contact with had caused her to become stuck or not, but she didn't let me loose right away. A moment later, the snake dropped to the ground and Leo contained her. Within less than a minute my index finger was swollen completely from the base to the tip, swollen to the point where it looked white from the blood being pushed from it.

My boys were not shaken at all by the event. Though I had never been bitten by a venomous snake even after 30 years of working with them, the boys had grown up around these animals and knew the worst case scenarios.

Knowing that Copperhead envenomations were rarely severe, I thought about continuing the snake hunt. I didn't want to let my boys down and it was a great day for what we were doing! However, within less than ten minutes now, my hand had swollen to the size of a softball and I realized I may be having an unusual allergic reaction to the bite.

The pain became excruciating rather quickly and it felt as if the pain was radiating outwards from within my bones to the surface of my skin. I decided that I would stop at the first house that had a vehicle in the driveway as I knew we were in a pretty remote area and had no idea where to find a hospital. [Editor's Note: This is a good reason to use a GPS with built-in nearest Hospital and route data.]

After driving for about ten minutes we came upon a house and the home owner greeted us with kindness. As it turned out, her son worked for an ambulance service so within a half hour of dispatch, an ambulance was on the scene.

The attendants were clearly not very well educated with knowledge of snake bite. Although very nice, one of the attendants began to explain to me that there was a good chance that I was going to die from this bite and that the Northern Copperhead was considerably more deadly (as he put it) than Pennsylvania's only other native venomous snake from the eastern area of the state, the Timber Rattlesnake. I just kept quiet and let him go on about it, I wasn't really in a mood to be talking facts with him at this point. Although my kids were holding back laughter at some of his stories.

Throughout the ride to the hospital which took just about an hour at 90 miles per hour, my vitals were monitored and I was offered but decided to refuse pain meds. I personally prefer not to take meds unless I really can't take the pain. By the time I reached the emergency room about an hour and forty five minutes after envenomation, my arm was swollen to my elbow and the pain followed the swelling, radiating up the length of my arm and feeling even more intense within my joints.

To my surprise, I was greeted like a celebrity at the hospital. There were many residents, doctors and interns waiting to view the bite and hear my story. Several people throughout this ordeal had asked me if it had happened at a Rattlesnake round-up which apparently is well known in the area.

Anyway, apparently my snakebite was one of only two that this hospital had ever seen, the other having been a Timber Rattlesnake. I thought it seemed unusual that in an area where Timber Rattlesnakes and Copperheads are so common, the hospital had only treated a couple of bites. I later learned from talking to local people that its not unusual for people in remote areas of Pennsylyvania to stay at home and avoid treating their snakebites. Money may play a key role in this behavior.

Anyway, by the time I had been admitted to the hospital, my pain was to the point where the doctors had me on a Morphine IV through which I could still feel the pain. I learned that the doctors had been online for quite some time researching copperhead bites and how to deal with them. My official doctor came in and explained to me that he would not administer antivenin because the one other time he had tried it, the patient almost died from shock (his exact words.) This was for a Timber Rattlesnake bite. I didn't mention it at the time because I was overwhelmed with pain, but I would think that they would have at least performed a scratch test to see if I was allergic to the antivenin, but whatever. [Editor's Note: Time to call 87-SERP-DRUG!]

During this whole experience, my entire body felt completely normal and totally uneffected by the snake bite except the areas in my right hand and arm which were obviously effected and swollen. I had no headaches, no nausea and no difficulty in breathing. I was able to function biologically 100% and remember even when I was at my peak of pain thinking, "Man, that intern is hot!"

I stayed the night in the hospital for observation. By 9 p.m., my arm was swollen to my shoulder and down the right side of my body as far down as my groin. It felt as if I had water beneath my skin and it moved like water when I moved parts of my body. I remember while urinating that there was an extraordinarily strong odor which smelled like latex rubber. I don't know if this was a direct effect of the bite or most likely from the morphine. I was able to press against my hand and leave indentations in the swelling that would only disappear after an hours time.

Bloody, serum filled blisters appeared on my bitten finger during the night and if I refrained from having my arm elevated, the swelling and pain would intensify ten fold. My veins and arteries on the affected hand looked to be collapsed and formed channels across my arm where they were once pronounced outwards. When I tried to stretch my arm into a straightened position over the course of weeks to follow, it felt like individual muscle strands were stretched to peak and were about to snap.

I was a slave to my swollen arm for the next two weeks until it had subsided enough for me to function with my arm at a normal level. As of this writing, it has been a month and a half now since my Copperhead bite and my bitten finger is still swollen. I have motion in the finger but cannot straighten it out completely, nor can I fold it downwards completely. The pain however is gone.

The blisters had been left alone and eventually absorbed back into my finger and the dried outer skin peeled off. I still have pain in my elbow joint when I lift anything relatively heavy.

Respectfully speaking, I am not regretful of the bite. It has been a learning experience, and I would be lying if I didn't say that somewhere inside of me I had harbored a morbid curiosity of experiencing a bite so I would have a better understanding of what many others have been through, and a better understanding of my chosen field. Once is enough though.

Thanks for reading and if you would like more info or to see photos, post here or e-mail skinscales@Yahoo.com

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