Posted on 05/17/2004 12:18:50 PM PDT by 11th Earl of Mar
ASSOCIATED PRESS
LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) - A curious pickup truck driver spotted a box in the grass marked "Live venomous reptile" east of downtown and stopped to take a look.
"When you see something like that, you want to look and see what it is," Paul Mitchell of Little Rock said of his Friday afternoon discovery. "I went over and kicked the box."
The electrician looked inside and found a cloth bag slithering into the form of a cobra ready to strike.
"I was like, 'Hot dog! That thing is big!'" Mitchell said.
Mitchell grabbed up the box, put it in the bed of his truck and took it to the Little Rock Zoo.
"I was just going to take it back to work and kill it, but I figure cobras aren't indigenous to Arkansas," Mitchell said. "I knew the zoo would have a snake handler."
Randal Berry, the zoo's reptile keeper, took the snakes in out of concern for public safety. He said the zoo doesn't usually take in animals.
Berry said the cobra was very aggressive as he pulled it from the sack, repeatedly rearing its hooded head. Also inside the box were a 14-inch-long twig snake; an East African bright green mamba that measured 6 feet long, and a 4-foot black mamba. All are highly venomous and there is no antivenin in Arkansas.
Berry said the snakes were in good condition and estimated that, together, they were worth about $1,000.
No one knows where the snakes came from. The box had no markings other than "Live venomous snakes." Berry said no snakes were missing from the zoo.
Cindy Dawson, assistant city attorney and zoo docent, guessed that the snakes came into the city illegally. Keeping, selling, possessing or maintaining venomous reptiles is illegal, though some exceptions are made for education, research and entertainment.
City officials said they're hopeful all the snakes are accounted for, but that they would remind any animal control workers that calls reporting any exotic snakes could be serious and not pranks.
Zoo officials said they haven't decided what they're going to do with the snakes, including the seething cobra.
"I don't want it here," Berry said with a laugh. "He's not a nice guy."
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Pizon! I bought one fer ma boy once fer Christmas. You want one fer yer boy. "Rock of ages, cleft fer me..." One of the best scenes ever from an "Earnest" movie.
The Arkansas Bar Association is going to be wondering why their officers are late for the meeting.
My friend told me a story that is bushman legend and has been pretty much verified: that one black mamba killed a dozen shepherds from Rhodesia in a single scrum. He told me another black mamba killed seven villagers in one night before being captured and living out its life peacefully in a zoo. Some of the Adders actually kill more people in Africa, but no snake kills multiple "threats" with the efficiency and quickness of a mamba. Magnificent serpent.
...When nature calls you to stop in her world to urinate, calculate the distance between your snake and mother natures snake...
didn't the story say "hillary reared her ugly head"???
I hate snakes
No. Arkansas had a choice between the Clintons and a box full of large, hungry, angry, venomous snakes and chose wisely.
Om my lord...your poor mother! How did she get the clothes out?
A friend of ours was a reptile dealer many years back & he had both a cobra & a black mamba. The black mamba escaped once due to a very stupid friend....that snake tracked them around the house. They were being hunted. Luckily, my friend was able to recapture it.
I heard a story once in the East Bay Area about a guy who saw a cardboard box in the middle of Highway 4 and ran over it, just for the heck of it.
It had apparently fallen off a truck, and it contained a small safe.
It is amazing all the stupid things we did as kids and managed to survive. We lived near a man made lake & were told by the adults that there were snake pits at the bottom. The area did have water moccasins and cottonmouths....so naturally we would jump off the docks and try to land in the snake pits.
That hurts just reading it.
A Jay Leno skit last year was mentioning secondary uses of common products found in fine print on the products. For the products, "Depends," the fine print read: "May be used as indoor plumbing in Arkansas."
...What you don't know, can kill. When you start "Pettin" learn your human limitations and know your pets behavior...
If I kicked a box full of snakes, let alone venemous ones, you would have to cut the grass in that area once a day for several years.
Those African mambas are cheaper than a divorce! I guess that's why they're illegal in the US. I doubt there is an antivenin anywhere in the US for them.
The Mrs. and I are still on great terms with each other. (As far as I know)
Did you commune with nature or your pant leg?
Steve Irwin sometimes scares me. He had one 'Crocodile Hunter' episode where he went to Africa to pester various venemous things. He rolls up in a village and runs into a hut that has a Black Mamba in it, to catch it. He chasing after Black and Green Mambas (up into the trees with them), a HUGE Puff Adder, and these nasty large scorpions.
I can't stop!!!!!!! ROTFLMA
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