Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Does anyone know what the statistics are for pet snake attacks versus wild attacks? I have this friend that is trying to tell me that More people are killed/attacked each year by escaped pet snakes than wild ones. I don't agree. I thought, yeah, there could be more bites, but not deaths. I snake isn't gonna try and kill something it can't eat, unless people are not careful with venomous snakes. Anyway, I told him that, say a constrictor, unless really big, isn't gonna try to coil around your neck and kill you. Any opinions or articles I could look at? Thanks.
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1.0 Dumeril's Boa(acrantophis dumerili)
1.0 Argentine Boa(Boa constrictor occidentalis)
0.1 Significant other
0.1 Roommate
0.1 Cat(Burden)
4.3 Fish(the cast of Pirates of the Carribean)

I have this friend that is trying to tell me that More people are killed/attacked each year by escaped pet snakes than wild ones.

First off, there is the semantic argument about the concept of a snake "attacking" a person. Snakes don't attack people, period. Is an accidental feeding bite considered an attack. When some idiot picks up a snake in his yard and it bites him, it isn't a case of a snake attacking him. In fact, you should challenge your friend to come up with a single documented case of a snake "attacking" a person. There area a few, but he/she probably doesn't know them.

Once you get past the semantic problems, I don't know that there are statistics about this but I can assure you wild snakes kill many more people each year than captive snakes. There is no comparison since thousands of people each year are killed by venomous snakes around the world whereas I doubt 10 people each year are killed by captives or escapted captives.
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Chris Harrison
San Antonio, Texas

>>Does anyone know what the statistics are for pet snake attacks versus wild attacks? I have this friend that is trying to tell me that More people are killed/attacked each year by escaped pet snakes than wild ones. I don't agree. I thought, yeah, there could be more bites, but not deaths. I snake isn't gonna try and kill something it can't eat, unless people are not careful with venomous snakes. Anyway, I told him that, say a constrictor, unless really big, isn't gonna try to coil around your neck and kill you. Any opinions or articles I could look at? Thanks.

My personal take is that way way more folks are attacked and killed by dogs or horses every year than any reptiles, especially snakes.
Stupid handling errors with large constrictors cause more trouble than anything else IMO. Feeding errors, handling an animal alone or being DUI are chief troubles. Whereas the dogs and horses are just plain dangerous. Hmmmm. Go fig.
Well you are right that a snake may not try to kill something it can't eat it CAN and WILL mistake your hand for a rat and work it's way from there in it's feeding instinct.
You could probably try the CDC or online stats for actual deaths.
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Sonya

I'm not mean. You're just a sissy.
Happy Bunny

I think the commonly accepted stat is that there are about 5,000 venomous snakebites in the US each year -- almost all involving native species encountered in the wild -- and between 5 and 10 fatalities. I would be surprised if there are more than two or three fatalaties per year from large constrictors, almost all from irresponsible solo handling of captive snakes. Worldwide I think the number of venemous snakebite deaths is 20,000 or so, most all of them in the Indian subcontinent from encounters in the wild by agricultural workers. To put it in perspective, far more people (more than 10) die each year in North American from dog maulings, bee sting reactions, bad oysters, pillows in cribs, falls from trees, slips on ice, lightning strikes and any number of other seemingly rare causes.

I saw Dr Sean Bush from Venom ER in person in Long Beach, CA. He gave a nice lecture on snakebite and treatment methods. One of the facts I left with was that a good percentage of envenomations in So Cal are people who interact with venemous snakes on purpose.

Of 4 people I know personally who have been bitten, including myself, all 4 were just careless enough when handling or moving a rattlesnake or cleaning a cage (or putting you hand down the wrong snake bag.. doi!) or lifting rocks in rattlesnake habitat with bare hands. 100% of those cases would not have happened if the people involved were not trying to handle or manuever the snake in some way, or if they were simply observing in the field w/o sticking their bare hands under rocks in known habitat. In other words, we knew the job was dangerous and we did it anyway.

In the US, snakebite is uncommon. In Asia, its another story.

>>I have this friend that is trying to tell me that More people are killed/attacked each year by escaped pet snakes than wild ones.

The only way you could make this statistic make sense would be if you limited it to non-venomous snakes in the U.S. There are no non-venoumous snakes in the wild (except possibly some of the burms in the everglades) capable of killing a human and there have been a handful of deaths from escaped constrictors over the last 100 years.

Every 3 to 10 years or so, someone is killed by their own pet constrictor, but due to careless handling or a feeding accident, not an escape.

Around 10 people a year are killed by wild venomous snakes.

I know of a TOTAL of 3 cases where someone other than the owner/handler was bitten by an escaped captive venomous snake. None were fatal. Two were being kept illegally anyway.

More importantly, all these numbers are statistically insignificant in a country of 280,000,000 people. You're more likely to be killed by lightening and far more likely to choke to death on your lunch today than to be killed by any kind of snake.

Tell your friend to watch out for meteors.
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What goes up must come down...unless it exceeds escape velocity.

With a comment like that,I think your friend has a very good chance of being hired by the "News Media". That is,..if he isn't working there already!!(LOL). ........This is just a wild guess,..but I would bet he's said some other rediculous things to you in the past as well.In all seriousness though, it's when misinformation like this finds it's way to the wrong people, or person, that hurts our hobby, and brings us one step closer to snakes being banned altogether.............take care

agecon.uwyo.edu/riskmgt/humanrisk/VenomousSnakeBite.pdf

www.dshs.state.tx.us/idcu/health/zoonosis/animal/bites/information/venom/snake/

Jeff
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Jeff Snodgres
University of Arkansas
snodgresjeffreys@uams.edu
501.603.1947