Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Posted with permission of kingsnake.com:

I am a board member of a herpetological society that is considering donating some money to organizations who aim to help herps, be it through doing research or conservation efforts. In order to better choose which organizations we should consider, we would like some suggestions from the kingsnake.com community.

If you know of a particular organization that you think is particularly deserving, please post it's name here or email me with the information.

A similar post will be placed in other forums, so please suggest organizations only related to helping out snakes, particularly venomous ones.

Thank you for your help.

As far as I know, Snake Getters is the only rescue/rehab group that focuses primarily on venomous snakes. If there's another, please let me know as I'd like to network with them!

We have nearly 100 volunteers all over Florida, responding to calls from police, sheriffs and fire/rescue to pick up snakes that are reported as venomous (though of course many turn out not to be). Our "fee" is that a bystander watch the snake and make sure it is not harmed or killed. Rescued animals are either relocated, donated or adopted by a volunteer depending on the species and the situation. In some cases they are injured, and need to be rushed to the vet clinic we work with.

Nonvenomous snakes get transported to the nearest charity wildlife hospital. That is not an option for the venomous species. Our volunteers often end up doing 150+ mile round trips to get the corals, rattlesnakes and cottonmouths to me for emergency patch-up and relief medication until the clinic opens. I am not a veterinarian, but I take from 50 to 100 hours of CE a year and have various certifications in categories such as veterinary assisting, wildlife emergency medicine and reptile medicine. Under the legal supervision of our veterinarian, we maintain an extensive stock of drugs and equipment to treat cases like this until they can be taken to the clinic.

Some of our current assets include a laboratory-grade microscope, a nebulizer, a ventilator, a range of precision digital scales and about $1k in veterinary textbooks. We are eying an oxygen setup for the ventilator so that it can be used for critical patient support and surgery at our facility for patients who should not be transported, but the funds don't exist for it at the moment. One of the new machines from Abaxis that does instant blood panels would permit advanced diagnostics for emergency patients that don't have time to wait for lab results. But again we can't afford it, and neither can the clinic we work with.

Our veterinarian does a lot of charity work (and work funded by the limited amount of money we can raise with book sales) on native and exotic venomous snakes. A few case writeups are here: http://www.kingsnake.com/snakegetters/demo/vet/index.html What I've had time to put on the site is only a small fraction of the cases that come in. Our most recent surgical case is a young cottonmouth shot through the neck by an air rifle; fortunately it was all soft tissue injury and his treatment was successful. He's doing fine and is due to have his stitches out soon.

We also do free educational workshops on safe and humane snake removal for public safety officers. Midwest (tongs.com) is kind enough to donate some of their factory seconds for us to distribute free to police departments, animal control and other departments so that snakes stand a better chance of being safely moved instead of shot. We offer a support system to 911, with two cell phones answered 24 hours a day where they can divert snake "emergency" calls. It's unfortunate that when the average police officer responds to a snake call, he shoots the animal. That's something we're working hard to change here in Florida.

We basically operate on a shoestring budget, a lot of volunteers and occasional fundraisers, but the monthly cost of this operation can be amazingly high on a seasonal basis when the most injured patients come in for treatment. Certainly any donations would be welcome - to our vet in a fund to cover expenses for the injured animals, to be able to purchase more equipment to donate to public safety officers, to get more life saving equipment for our emergency home clinic, to train more volunteers, etc.

We also budget a bit for more extensive lab tests than some patients actually need, as a way of adding to the general veterinary database on the unique needs of venomous species - their species specific drug tolerances, their particular illnesses and injuries, etc. I regularly present these results at veterinary conferences so that they can be shared with other vets who are seeing venomous snakes, and we are looking at eventual publication (probably in Exotic DVM) when we have gathered enough data. Some of the information is in our e-book, Safe Veterinary Restraint of Venomous and Dangerous Reptiles.

We sell books and take donations here: http://www.kingsnake.com/snakegetters/manuals.html

Might I add that all of the volunteers that legally remove venomous snakes here in Florida must be licensed at an annual cost of $100? Keep up the good work, Ms TT.

~~Greg~~

Our current policy goes like this. Since the majority of calls we get describing an 8 foot long rattlecobra with 6 inch fangs dripping human blood actually turn out to be a garter snake, the closest volunteer is sent to the scene regardless of whether or not they are venomous licensed. Most of the time they will be able to catch and relocate the garter snake or rat snake or racer without needing any license other than the no-cost nuisance wildlife removal permit. People are remarkably bad about identifying snakes on the phone, especially when they are frightened.

If the volunteer goes to the scene and the snake is in fact venomous, they are supposed to call the hotline back and get the nearest licensed volunteer dispatched. Though if simple relocation out of harm's way is an option in a rural area (as in, chase the rattlesnake back into the bushes about 50 feet) they may legally do so under their nuisance removal permit if they do not take possession of the snake.

I like short distance translocation whenever feasible, as it cuts down on the expenses. Non relocatable animals (eg, picked up in downtown Orlando with no suitable habitat anywhere nearby) have to be taken in, given health examinations and treatment, gotten acclimated and feeding and then adopted out. That costs money, so the "dump in the bushes" option is a pretty good one from my point of view. Unfortunately it's not always the best or safest one for the snake.

Why do people have to be licensed to move a venomous snake? Is this state law or your organizations rule. If its a state law, that is the most retarded thing I have ever heard. If its just your org's law, then yes, I can see the point of it.

Sounds like you guys are doing great things. Keep up the good work, and maybe when I move to Florida next year, I can volunteer as well.

I don't make the laws, but in order to keep operating legally I have to ask that all our volunteers abide by them.

Basically you need a venomous permit to take possession of a venomous snake here in FL. If the volunteer never takes possession, but just picks it up on a hook and walks it back fifty feet into the bushes, that is legal to do without a license according to the officers who advised me on the subject. What an unlicensed volunteer cannot do is to take the snake away from the scene, eg, take possession of it. They may temporarily contain it until the licensed volunteer does arrive however.

One of the reasons this is actually a pretty good law is all the seriously dum@$$ inbred people in this state who would otherwise be hunting rattlesnakes to sell for beer money. That used to be a fairly popular pastime when Ross Allen's institute was legally buying Easterns and other venomous snakes from any yahoo that could catch them with a wire noose. That was definitely not a good thing, so I'll happily agree with the licensing requirement for taking possession of a venomous snake.