A good idea would be to get involved with your community, talk about snakes and how the media makes them into monsters when in fact they are no where near the threat may people think they are.

I volunteer my time every year with my local reptile organization to man a booth at the Wildlife Festival near the end of March, which is held in one of the malls in the city. Alot of people move through the mall during the weekend and my reptile org's booth is often a favorite...I answer alot of questions about snakes and we typically only have small species on display (ball pythons, corns, brazilian rainbow boas, black rat snakes, bull snakes, boa constrictor and various lizards, like bearded dragons, blue tongue skinks, etc.) A local reptile zoo often has a booth there too and they bring some of the big boys...including a very large Burmese python and they do a great show on education. They also at times have a small crocodile (or alligator, can't remember) maybe 3-4 feet long and other interesting reptiles from their zoo.

The point here is being in this situation gives you a chance to tell people the correct information about our passions, to show reptile owners and breeders are not freaks and the animals we love are not vicious man eaters out to eat our children. Snakes are very simple creatures and have very basic and simple reasons to attack. A feeding response, or a defense response. They certainly don't plot ahead of time who they are going to eat.

But being out in the public in a relatively controlled situation, presenting people with a snake that is comfortable with being touched by nervous people etc. and talking about the animal, answering questions etc. really impacts people far more. Touching a Burmese python while a few handlers hold it so no accidents happen, amaze people up to that moment would swear they were terrified of snakes. I had so many people shocked by the feel of a snake...finding it feels like soft leather etc...not slimy or cold (often my hands have warmed up the snake's body sufficiently they really don't feel cold they they tend to). Besides, its fun introducing people to something they probably wouldn't have encountered normally. It gets them curious, makes them realize what they knew before from other sources isn't true. It may even be enough for them to research more on reptiles and realize they are not the man eaters and scary things they grew up believing they were.
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PHLdyPayne

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