Snakebite and guardian dogs what should I do?

animalmom

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I vaccinate my three dogs each year with the rattlesnake vaccine, period, not up for discussion with DH just pay the vet type of action. I've had the dogs get bit by rattlesnakes and the vaccine does make the bite less dangerous. One dog got bit on the muzzle that fortunately drained into the sinuses. She was very swollen for a while but recovered. Vet said it was lucky she got struck where she did because based on the width of the two fang hole it had to have been a large snake. She didn't have the vaccine. Another dog was bit on the leg, had the vaccine earlier in the year and had very little swelling. Could be she didn't get much venom, but I'll swear by the vaccine.
 

Mike CHS

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I didn't know they even had a vaccine for rattlesnakes. I have seen several copper heads but no rattlesnakes yet. Neighbors say they are supposedly around but haven't seen any.
 

samssimonsays

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I had watched a show once on a guy who removed snakes and dangerous animals in California area and The one family called him in as a large rattle snake had bit their dog and it didn't survive. He came out and got it, the thing was massive and he told them about the vaccine. He also said once someone/thing is bit they have a heightened immunity to it? the body is already exposed to the venom and it aids in how the body responds to it or something like that. I am unsure exactly how true this is but I knew several people who swore by the vaccine when they lived in arizona as well.
 

Timberdoodle

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Weve been very lucky with only two bites in several years but because of last year's rain and our new pond, I'm expecting a snakey spring. I worry about water moccasins and rattlers. I understand that some of the antivenins are cost prohibitive are there other treatments?

You all may hate me for a non PC answer but, frankly I would prefer to teach the dogs Avoidance training. The fastest and best way to accomplish this is with...GASP.....a shock collar. It takes only a few seconds of discomfort for a lifetime of protection against snakes. Done correctly, it takes only 3 or 4 times shocked to ingrain a snake avoidance mentality. I've spent countless hours hunting over dogs in the Arizona desert, rattlesnakes are a daily and ever present fact of life there. All my dogs were trained on snake Avoidance, I NEVER had a single dog bit in all our encounters. Like I said earlier, an ounce of prevention and discomfort up front is worth a pound of cure and pain the dog lives with if bitten and envenomated. One taught, the avoidance lasted a lifetime, the dogs would yield huge tracts of land just to get around/by any snake encountered. My neighbor once chastised me for being so "cruel" to my dogs for using a shock collar to teach this concept.....until she showed up on my door step one evening asking me help to carry her snakebit Boxer out of the forest. The Boxer lived the short term and died of kidney failure 2 years later...connected?....maybe. Why jump to treatments when there is a preventative option????
 

Southern by choice

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This is one time I do think the proper use of a shock collar is acceptable. However avoidance training only goes so far with LGD's. The reality is they are on the move and running through woods etc they can still get bit so if there is a vaccine that can help why not.

My son got bit by a copperhead running through the woods.
Our cat same thing.

Rattlers are flat out scary.
 

Timberdoodle

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This is one time I do think the proper use of a shock collar is acceptable. However avoidance training only goes so far with LGD's. The reality is they are on the move and running through woods etc they can still get bit so if there is a vaccine that can help why not.

My son got bit by a copperhead running through the woods.
Our cat same thing.

Rattlers are flat out scary.

I've lived/worked/hunted/recreated around almost all the N American venomous snakes. I'll take rattlesnakes any day over Copperheads and Water Moccasins. A majority of rattlesnakes will do their level best to get out of your way and give ample warning before a strike. There are exceptions (Mojave rattlesnake) but, by and large, I'm more comfortable around rattlesnakes than the others.
 

Southern by choice

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I've lived/worked/hunted/recreated around almost all the N American venomous snakes. I'll take rattlesnakes any day over Copperheads and Water Moccasins. A majority of rattlesnakes will do their level best to get out of your way and give ample warning before a strike. There are exceptions (Mojave rattlesnake) but, by and large, I'm more comfortable around rattlesnakes than the others.

LOL - copperheads are pretty harmless as far as venomous snakes... we have had LOTS of bites... humans, cats, dogs :rolleyes:
 

Latestarter

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Copperheads are the least toxic of the venomous snakes in North America. But they CAN be pretty danged mean for their size. Probably the most toxic drop for drop is the northern pacific rattlesnake which has recently been proven to be developing neuro toxicity to add to it's already potent hemo toxic venom. One of the bad rattlers over on the south eastern seaboard is the cane break rattler... they are smaller than a diamondback or copperhead and sneaky! They have a very powerful venom also.

In other news, it has also been documented that rattle snakes are "learning" that announcing their presence can and often does lead to death and therefore are "learning" to NOT announce their presence when humans are about. Obviously this can be detrimental to the human who is counting on being notified when he/she is getting too close to said rattle snake. I have come stumbling down mountain hiking trails and found rattlers lying perfectly still, right across the trail, and they haven't MOVED, let alone rattled, until I touched/moved them with a stick at which point they shot off the trail and started rattling like crazy and hissing and striking. They HAD to have felt the vibrations of my approach and froze hoping I wouldn't notice them. Not a warm fuzzy feeling to experience.

It is also my understanding that being bitten by a young snake will almost always be a full venom bite where as an adult can and does control its venom and prefers to NOT use it except when trying for a prey kill or left no other choice... like being pestered by a dog (that doesn't know any better) or a "kid" (deliberately messing with it or running too close and not paying attention).

I very much like and appreciate snakes... ALL snakes... and do not kill them under virtually any circumstances.
 

Mike CHS

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A little side story from when I was about 16 years old. I was squirrel hunting in the hills outside of the sleepy little town (at that time :) ) of Branson Missouri with an elderly gent that I often worked for. We were walking along a rocky ledge and he frantically said FREEZE and DO NOT MOVE. I stopped and looked at him confused and he was looking down at the ground. I had stepped over one of the biggest rattle snakes that I had ever seen and I felt fear for the first time in my young life. As soon as I stopped moving my friend and boss shot the head off of that thing and I think I jumped about 5 feet backward at the same time.
 

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