Lots and lots of VENOM!

Awhile back, Daddy and I watched a show about people being killed by their exotic pets, and it showed a facility where venom is extracted to make anti-venom. The guy only had some of his fingers. There are only six of these facilities in the United States, so I was super excited to see that one is in Deland, where Daddy's friends live. We visited the Reptile Discovery Center just in time to see the venom extraction. First they brought out three snakes for us to hold or pet.

Indigo snake, a very common harmless Florida snake.

I really loved this piebald ball python, his white coloring with the brown pattern is so unique that I found it beautiful. 

So if you ever want to buy me a snake... (wink, wink) but you'd have to come feed it for me because, um yah, I just can't.

This is an albino ball python.

Once the snakes were put away, it was time for the extraction to begin. We watched the procedures from behind a glass wall. They extracted venom from a few snakes of each kind, each being much larger than the previous, starting with Coral snakes, then Copperheads, Rattlesnakes, Cottonmouth and ending with the very intimidating Monacled Cobra! 

They bring out the snake, set it on the table, the woman holds it down mid-body while the man grabs it's head after holding it down with a metal rod. He then makes it bite on the glass which collects it's venom. The venom is then sent from this lab to places around the world that will create anti-venom, pharmaceuticals or for research.

You can actually see the yellow venom pouring into the cup. They aggregate 

the venom from 3 snakes per type before collecting the venom in a tube to process.

To make an anti-venom, they inject very small amounts into horses or cows, then they take blood from those animals, spin it down to the antibodies, remove the DNA of the host animal, then extract only the antibody portion. 

Afterwards, they came back out to answer questions. Of course I had to ask if he's been bitten. "Eleven times" he said, but he still has all his fingers, unlike the guy we had seen in the tv show who was missing a few.

Approximately 625 snakes are in the venom line at this lab. Their venom is extracted every 2 weeks (except the rattlesnakes who don't like to be handled, are on a 3 week schedule). They are fed mice and rats, except for the coral snakes who normally eat other snakes. Since they don't have the supply of baby snakes to feed them, they tube feed them a chicken based meal right after their extraction. 

Lastly we took a hike thru their trails which allowed us to see alligators, snakes and turtles along the way.

You know you're in Florida when you come across a "bug spray station" and it even has a place to update visitors on the bug conditions before the hike. I'm glad we were there during "some bugs", I would hate to see "bugs will eat you alive" conditions.