Columbia, SC - (WLTX) — Summer is here so that means many people will be hiking, biking and exploring nature.
That means it's more possible to run into creatures that slither through the garden.
Scott Pfaff, curator of Herpetology at Riverbanks Zoo & Garden has a few word of advice for people who find themselves too close for comfort with a snake.
"The thing to do if you encounter a snake is just it leave it alone," Pfaff says. "Bites usually occur when people get close enough to kill the snake or pick it up."
He goes on to explain that it's possible for a snake to be active even if it's dead.
"If they're dead, their body can still be active for a period of time after that," he says. "There is residual electrical energy, for a lack of a better word, so it may move.
"So, if you decapitate a snake and then pick up the head, it's fully capable of biting," Pfaff says. "If you puncture yourself on one of the snakes veins then venom can be injected," he says.
So how does one know what type of snake does this, and how long can a snake stay alive?
Pfaff says, "It's universal for all reptiles that, if the animal is dead, the muscles can still contract for a little while. It truly depends. It can be minutes or hours."