During a program the other day, a question that made me pause. “How do you get these owl and hawk mounts if it’s illegal to shoot them?” a student asked, after I had told him his family couldn’t shoot the great horned owl that was preying on their cats. A valid question.
“We’re those strange people who gather road and window kills,” I replied.
Indeed, that’s where many of our mounts and study skins come from. A look inside the KWEC freezer would reveal mice for the KWEC screech owls, kestrel and snakes, an odd rodent or two found and frozen for study skins and several birds found alongside the road or under windows. Their untimely deaths and recoveries result in study skins and mounts for educational purposes.
Needless to say, working at a nature center is not your average, everyday kind of job, and often results in some “wild” stories. Last summer, I traveled Central Kansas to libraries for summer reading programs with several animals, including a massasauga rattlesnake. He rides in a securely locked five gallon bucket.
I have a healthy respect for venomous snakes and let other people more comfortable with them remove and put them back in their enclosures. Toward the end of the summer however, I decided there was no reason I couldn’t do this for myself, so I asked our graduate student who works with snakes for guidance.
Using a snake stick – a three foot long metal pole with a gripper on one end – he demonstrated how to remove and put the massasauga in its enclosure. I then tried it and all went well.
“Don’t trap yourself,” Jeff said, two or three times, “Always have an exit.”
Which is a little difficult, due to the location of the cage. The handler has to stand to the side and reach around the cage.
A couple of weeks later, I was loading up to leave for another library program and everyone was busy, so I removed the rattlesnake myself and all went smoothly. Feeling proud of myself, I thought I’d put him back in when I returned, since again, everyone was occupied.
I positioned the bucket, got the snake stick ready, noticing that he seemed more active than usual. I opened the bucket, working quickly to grab him just behind the head - the trick is to use firm pressure but not so firm the snake is injured. That part went well, but as I reached around to put him in the enclosure, he wouldn’t move to the back as usual.
Deciding I could just release my hold on the snake with one hand and push the door closed with the other, I proceeded. The snake had other ideas. He shot forward toward the opening, as I shut the door, catching his head in the door. Yikes! Not wanting to break his spine, I opened the door a little. In that second, he shot out, falling on the floor.
At this point, my heart was in my throat, but I think he was as surprised as I was, so I had time to grab him again and lift him into the cage. Except he didn’t want to go into the cage and tried the same thing. Hearing Jeff’s words in my head, “Don’t trap yourself,” I thought, “what now?” Then I heard Curtis Wolf, KWEC site manager, get off the phone in the next room.
“Curtis, I need some help in here,” I said, fairly calmly I thought, considering the situation.
He sized up the scene and took over the snake stick, but the snake by this time was not especially happy. Curtis finally got him in the enclosure and I slammed the door shut. It was then I noticed the door was on upside down, so we had to go through the whole procedure one more time – removing the snake, fixing the door, and putting him back in.
That was the day my original supposition was proven – I am not comfortable handling venomous snakes.