On June 22, 2012, I was bitten on the right index finger by a rattlesnake. I was unofficially picking up trash on a very trashy section of the eastern Pueblo Canyon Rim Trail in Los Alamos. The trail runs along the north side of the Los Alamos Airport, all the way past Los Alamos County Pajarito Cliffs Site on Camino Entrada and over to the Camp Hamilton Trail. Fortunately, I was on the section just below the parking lot for the Pajarito Cliffs Site so help was close. I was near Building 5, where the Los Alamos County Parks Division is.
Sadly, the eastern Pueblo Canyon Rim Trail gets lots of trash blown down from the Los Alamos County facilities. I can walk on the trail from my house so I use it often. Each time, I see the trash and feel guilty for walking past so I finally decided to clean it up. This was my second time picking up trash on that trail. The first time, I worked below Building 1 of the Pajarito Cliffs Site.
It was a very hot afternoon. I parked at the Los Alamos Co-op because I planned to shop there afterward. Clouds were building over the mountains.
As I went along, I put the trash - bottles, cans, paper, etc. - in Vitamin Cottage plastic bags that I'd saved and reused over the years. My aim was to fill up a few bags each time I went on the trail and dump the trash in the county dumpsters behind Building 5. The stuff I couldn't fit in bags, big pieces of plastic sheeting and squashed cardboard boxes, I carried uphill to the edge of the parking lot. It felt good doing this a second time because surely now I would stick with the project and not have to look at all that nasty litter. If you've ever walked the Pueblo Canyon Rim Trail, you've seen its truly astounding views of towering tuff cliffs in Pueblo Canyon and of the Jemez Mountains west of Los Alamos. It seems a shame that the trail is such trash-strewn eyesore.
I was picking up trash around a drainage area lined by rocks that the trail crosses - there are four of them along this section that drain the Pajarito Cliffs area. The drainage rocks are a challenge to get across, some are tippy and they are angled every which way. In addition, I painfully discovered they provide an ideal hiding place for rattlers wishing to get out of the blazing sun.
All I remember was bending over and reaching my right hand (I'm right-handed) to pick up a piece of trash next to a rock. I remember it as a small edge of a rock with maybe the tiniest washout underneath. To retrieve the trash, I must have got the side of my hand partially under the rock to have been bitten without seeing the rattlesnake. Then I remember quickly withdrawing my hand because it felt like I had shoved it into jagged, broken glass. Blood was dripping from the first finger joint above the knuckle. I was so mad at myself for shoving my hand into glass. The finger was stinging and burning and I cradled my finger as it dripped blood.
If the snake had made a warning sound, I would have heard it but I'm positive no sound was made. The Pajarito Environmental Education website has a page on Snakes of the Pajarito Plateau which explains that the prairie rattler, the most common rattler on the Plateau, doesn't rattle as readily as the western diamondback; you can be close to a prairie rattler but not know it's there.
I wore fingerless, cloth gardening gloves. The snake fang marks were at the edge where the glove fabric stopped. I wonder if I had worn full-fingered work gloves, would the bite have been as deep? The snake fangs would have had to go through greater fabric thickness. Using fingerless gloves to pick up trash was not smart. Fingers are too valuable, as I have found out!
After being bitten, I carried the trash bags the short distance uphill and put them at the edge of the parking lot and ran over to Building 5. I didn't even say hello to the friendly Parks office receptionists as I raced past them to the bathroom to wash off the blood to see where the glass shards were but I saw none. The receptionists were very concerned and got out a first aid kit to offer help. I told them I'd like a closer look to find the glass. They gave me a magnifying glass but I still saw none.
I've lived in Los Alamos since 1985 and the few rattlers I've seen while hiking were in White Rock or Bandelier. One inveterate hiker who has lived here for 62 years told me she's seen one rattlesnake in all that time, near the Mitchell Trail. Not seeing a lot of rattlers led to my being blasé and not realizing that a snake doesn't need much room to hide under a rock.
After I discarded the broken glass theory, I realized that something had bit me. I took the fingerless glove off because the index finger was quickly becoming bruised and swollen. The receptionists offered to take the trash to the dumpster but silly me said you'll get dirty. So, I walked back (not very far) to where I left the trash and took it to the dumpsters (not a huge distance). Then I went back to the Parks office and asked the receptionists to call my son-in-law who works in Building 1. They did but instead of waiting patiently for him to drive over, I walked to his office. The distances were not long but wasted time and allowed the venom to further perfuse. The antivenom helps save fingers and toes. It's important to get treatment as soon as possible and not dither. Imagine if I had been further away from help?
Still in denial, though, my knuckle-headed plan was for my son-in-law drive me over the Co-op and then I could drive myself to the Los Alamos Medical Center. Wise man that he is, he firmly told me "No, you might go into shock." I appreciate his level-headedness and taking time from his work day to take me to the emergency room. I was seen quickly. They could clearly see two fang marks - one, at the edge of my right index finger, the deeper one that had bled and the other, a superficial dark spot, about 1/2" away and on the bottom of joint.
One odd occurrence in the emergency room was my lips started to feel blubbery. The emergency room notes described them as grossly enlarged. A doctor told me the next day that I looked like Angelina Jolie after a barroom brawl! My voice got squeakier and squeakier. I was scared that my throat was closing but the notes say my airway was not compromised. They gave me Benedryl and epinephrine which helped. My lips remained enlarged until the next morning in the ICU. I read online that sometimes people have an increased sensitivity to rattlesnake venom if they have prior exposure to rattlesnake proteins. As far as I know, I've never had such prior exposure.
The emergency room marked the progress of the swelling as it went up my arm. It stopped short of my elbow. Before I was actually bit by a rattlesnake, I thought antivenom was given in a shot and then you went home and you were cured. I didn't realize the real threat was not to my life but to the tissue damaged by the venom and the antivenom helps counteract this. One interesting fact is that rattlesnake venom has a longer half-life than the CroFab antivenom which is why they gave me a loading dose via IV in the emergency room and then 3 more IV doses over the next 24 hours in the ICU. I had the mildest elevation of blood clotting times which quickly reversed itself. Soon after I got out of the hospital, though, I noticed a floridly technicolor bruise on my left elbow, a result of the temporary thinning of my blood by the snake venom.
The bite caused my right index finger to be very painful - burning and throbbing - but other than giving me the antivenom, telling me keep my hand elevated above my heart and offering pain relief, there was not much else they could do. There was no orthopedist on call at the medical center that weekend. The hospitalist consulted with an orthopedic physician assistant at Christus St. Vincent Hospital in Santa Fe because she was concerned about how swollen and dusky-colored my finger was. It was obvious the circulation was compromised. She kept me another night in the ICU to watch it.
When I got out of the hospital, I went to a hand surgeon in Santa Fe. His wonderful staff made a splint that greatly helped the swelling. For the longest time, I had a bleb (a blister in snakebite terminology) at the base of my index finger. It was ugly. It changed from day to day - sometimes with a black edge, sometimes red with blood inside, partially clear on other days. At another visit, the hand surgeon wrapped the finger in Coban (great stuff!) to help the swelling. The wrap seemed to help finally dry the bleb out. I read online that sometimes blebs act as a reservoir for the venom so I was glad to see it go.
Right now, my right index finger is still stiff and swollen. I call it my mega pointer finger. I can't properly bend the fingertip or make a full fist to shake at the next rattler that I see! I'm told it's going to take a while for things to get back to normal. I've seen images online of much more horrific damage so I'm grateful that it's not worse. Because I can't make a full fist yet, I kid people that I won't be getting into any more barroom brawls and I'll have to give up my lifelong dream of becoming a boxer!
I've gone back twice to the bite-site to find the exact rock. I've found candidates but can't be sure which is THE ROCK. What really hurts is that new trash has already blown down from Pajarito Cliffs parking lot onto the area I'd cleaned up.
Next time I pick up trash on that trail, the weather will be cool and I'll wear work gloves. If there is trash near where a snake can hide, I'll either use a stick to dislodge the trash or, to my chagrin, leave it in place.
Because I got bitten while trying to clean up a trail, a lot of people told me "No good deed goes unpunished!" But to the hapless rattlesnake, I was doing a very bad deed by suddenly infringing on its cool hiding spot! Won't make that mistake again!!