Talk:List of fatal snake bites in the United States

Untitled
Message from articles pricipal author concerning references: All content is derived from the the references cited in the Notes as well as the General Reference section. I have expanding the article and updating the references on my list of things to do. --Hokeman (talk) 04:57, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

Florida Snake Variety doubtful
The article refers to the wide variety of poisonous snakes in Florida. That claim is very subjective, there being only five venomous snake types in the State, and not all throughout the State. The types are the water mocassin (cottonmouth), the copperhead (N. Florida only), the diamondback and pigmy rattlesnakes and the coral. To refer to this as a "wide variety" is likely misleading.146.23.68.40 (talk) 17:27, 2 December 2010 (UTC)

This page greatly underestimates rattlesnake fatalities
I have researched historic accounts of rattlesnakes in some upper Midwestern States and know that this page leaves the impression of a lot fewer fatalities by rattlesnakes than actually occurred. Deaths were quite common before the 1900, but few people have searched the early papers, death records, and histories to find them. In Iowa I documented more than 80 death between the 1840's and 1940's. In Michigan I found more than 20 deaths. Even in Minnesota, toward the northern end of their range, I found at least 15 deaths. I recently submitted a manuscript documenting two early deaths in Ontario to the Bulletin of the Canadian Association of Herpetologists and have given two talks at the national ASIH meetings on historic accounts of rattlesnakes in Minnesota. Below are the titles and abstracts of those two talks.

Mahaffy, J.F. 2009. Historic Extensions of Rattlesnake Ranges (Timber Rattlesnake, Crotalus horridus and Massasauga, Sistrurus catenatus) from Five Counties in South-eastern and South-central Minnesota. Presented at ASIH meetings July 22-27 at Portland Oregon. Abstract: http://homepages.dordt.edu/~mahaffy/rattle/ASIH09_abstract03.2.pdf

Mahaffy, J.F. 2007. Historic Evidence for Rattlesnakes (Massasauga, Sistrurus catenatus, and the Timber Rattlesnake, Crotalus horridus) from Mitchell County in Northeastern Iowa and from Mower County in Southeastern Minnesota. Presented at ASIH meetings July 11-17 at St Louis, Missouri. Abstract: http://homepages.dordt.edu/~mahaffy/rattle/Evidence_Rattlesnakes_Mitchell_Mower.doc

Perhaps a statement like "rattlesnake deaths were very common in some Midwestern states in the 1800's in the early settlement days" should be added to your article.

Mahaffy (talk) 00:23, 15 March 2011 (UTC)James Mahaffy (mahaffy@dordt.edu)


 * Agreed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Thetruth97thetruth97 (talk • contribs) 10:53, 27 March 2015 (UTC)

Before 1900
Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 19:07, 15 January 2011 (UTC)

Article deletion or major change?
I am concerned that this article may not meet WP:N. Although the topic of fatal snake bites may be notable, individual fatalities are not notable from an encyclopedic perspective and a list of them also does not seem notable. Most fatal bites are never reported in the news media, which is why this list contains only a small fraction of all fatal bites in the US. Should this article be changed to a general article on fatal snake bites and have the list dropped? Alternatively, should it be folded into Epidemiology of snakebites and Snakebite and the rest deleted? Specifically, see WP:NOTESAL. The list in this article has not been discussed as a set by independent reliable sources, but rather has been created by us as Wikipedia editors. Onefireuser (talk) 13:57, 3 October 2014 (UTC)

Could be more useful if it gave more relevant/interesting data. Like adding the location as a column in the tables. And, it could be greatly expanded with non-fatal information. It would be very interesting to see, for example, which states have more snake bites, and possibly per-capita ratios. There has to be more data out there that would make this page far more useful. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.251.108.143 (talk) 16:59, 12 April 2016 (UTC)

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Billy Glide death
Glide was bitten by a snake by died from alcohol intoxication, exacerbated by liver problems. See Tapered (talk) 11:38, 25 September 2017 (UTC)

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Death of Pfc. Norman Murburg
The Murburg snakebite death should be removed from this list altogether--and here's why: http://www.wral.com/news/local/story/7956220/. I'm not entirely sure how to do this without getting my hand slapped for being "disruptive," as I've never attempted this sort of editing of a Wikipedia page; would someone who is more familiar than I am with the process do this? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.110.242.175 (talk) 16:06, March 11, 2018
 * In most cases, simply removing the incorrect information with an informative edit summary which explains why and lists the corrected source is enough. If the removal is reverted, then discussion on the talk page and citing the correcting source is usually the next step.  I've gone ahead and removed it because the second article makes it clear that the original statement was not supported by later investigations.  The fact that the Army made changes to its training regimen to prevent a repeat strongly suggests the death was more likely to be dehydration then snakebite. Eggishorn (talk) (contrib) 17:06, 14 March 2018 (UTC)
 * The ostensible reference was included in the edit summary, not the article. That link didn't work, so I did research. The most recent verdict seems NOT to be snakebite, so I'm removing the section. See below also. Putting a broken link in an edit summary is poor editing. Tapered (talk) 23:41, 8 April 2018 (UTC)
 * , I'm not sure you understand what I wrote. I'm also not sure you understand what I did.  I can't put a reference for a removed section into a section that's not there, for what should be obvious reasons.  The link wasn't "broken", it simply required the user to cut and paste it into their browser address bar.  To add it back an entry because you couldn't do that and then remove it again while actually agreeing with my edit summary is a poor editing practice in itself. Eggishorn (talk) (contrib) 02:36, 9 April 2018 (UTC)
 * I still can't understand what you wrote, you're correct. Given that you haven't reverted my edits to the article, I'm quite satisfied if you are. Regards Tapered (talk) 03:28, 9 April 2018 (UTC)

Paula Halfacre
I could find no media outlet report of Ms. Halfacre's death by snakebite in 2015. Just a YouTube memorial. Ergo, the section has been deleted. Tapered (talk) 23:48, 8 April 2018 (UTC)

Figures for captive snake bites.
These would be a good addition to the article. Hard to find the details tho.--Cynthia BrownSmyth (talk) 07:57, 4 January 2021 (UTC)

Reverse Chronology
This reverse chronology of the dates is unusual, and is in contrast to the similar article List of fatal snake bites in Australia. Is it worth re-structuring? NiKChE (talk) 14:35, 10 August 2022 (UTC)