State toughens up rules for snake hunt contests

The permit fee may raise from $5 to $50.
CROSS FORK, Pa (AP) -- About halfway down a steep mountain valley, amid sun-warmed rocks and a tree stump, three timber rattlesnakes lay coiled, soaking up the midmorning June sun.
Unafraid, Shane Hahn moved in.
With a tool that looked like a golf club with a hook, he gentled grabbed the venomous snake near its head, using his other hand to lift its thick body. About 45 inches long, it had a black head and eyes, with dark crossbands -- a black phase rattlesnake.
A member of the Keystone Reptile Club, Hahn, of Waynesboro, was demonstrating the sport of snake hunting on the weekend of the 34th annual Cross Fork Snake Hunt, an event he and his companions were helping to run.
Organized hunts, in which snakes are caught, measured and then later released, are big fundraisers for a handful of volunteer fire departments, mostly in northern Pennsylvania. Seven hunts were permitted by the state this season, which ends July 31 -- five by fire departments, two by sports clubs.
Officials' concerns
But the state Fish and Boat Commission is worried about declining numbers of timber rattlesnakes, which are considered "species of concern," and is proposing new restrictions. Hunt organizers fear the rule changes could hurt fundraising.
"This is 90 percent of our money right here," said Barry Gipe, spokesman for the Kettle Creek Hose Co. No. 1, which clears $18,000 to $20,000 from the event in Cross Fork, in Potter County.
While only a few dozen or so people may take part in an organized hunt, the weekend festivals can draw several thousand people. Prizes are given for categories including longest rattlesnake (53 inches was the longest of 21 rattlesnakes brought in this year at Cross Fork), most rattles (21 this year) and the heaviest pair (6 pounds, 12 ounces this year).
The state wants to raise permit fees from $5 to $50, figuring fewer people will hunt snakes; establish a 42-inch minimum length in hopes of protecting smaller females; limit a hunter's participation to one organized hunt a year; and ban sacking contests.
"The whole plan here is to strike a balance between a recreational use and trying to allow the species to continue," said Dan Tredinnick, spokesman for the fish commission, which expects to vote on the new rules Tuesday.
Last year, 1,126 people got permits to hunt snakes and 160 were taken. Participants in organized hunts cannot kill snakes, though state law allows hunters to get a permit to kill one a year. The state does not have statistics on how many were killed or kept in captivity.
Gipe and other beneficiaries of the hunts said they worry the proposed restrictions could lead to the demise of snake hunts.
Sacking
Already, sacking contests are falling by the wayside.
Bill Wheeler Jr., president of the Keystone Reptile Club, which runs about half the organized hunts, including Cross Fork, said he decided to end the contests last year because of liability concerns and because he realized they sent the wrong message about the treatment of the snakes.
In sacking contests, teams of two enter a pen filled with western diamondback rattlesnakes (the state long ago stopped the use of native snakes) to see which team can bag them the fastest. One person holds open a sack and the other person tosses the snakes inside. Bites have occurred.
"Snake hunts often bill themselves as educational messages. There's good educational messages and bad educational messages," Tredinnick said. "This is one of the things we think sends the wrong message."
"We want to keep it going," Gipe said of the snake hunt. "But not doing the sacking, I don't know how much it's going to effect us."
Snake hunt critics have found the sacking contests particularly troubling.
"If there is one deplorable element to a snake hunt in my mind, it's sacking," said Jack Hubley, a wildlife lecturer and host of a a weekly nature feature for WGAL-TV in Lancaster.
He said the contests "reduce a magnificent animal to a score on a card. And the animal itself is completely lost," he said. The snakes can also get injured.
Organized rattlesnake hunts "were born in an age when we were trying to rid the world of these noxious beasts," said Hubley, who believes the proposed regulatory changes are a step in the right direction.
"Snake hunts themselves kind of place a value on the animal and that's not bad," he said.
In agreement
The Keystone Reptile Club president agreed.
"If I get one person to stop killing every snake they see in their yard, I think we've done a good thing," Wheeler said.
After snakes are measured at the organized hunts, they are frequently fitted by fish commission staff with a small tag containing information on size, location and date of capture should they be recaptured. Then are required to be returned to where they were taken.
"We want all the snakes taken [back] where they got 'em," Wheeler said during the Cross Fork hunt. "The same rock, the same log -- not out the window because you're in the same township."
Heidi Prescott, senior vice president of campaigns for the Humane Society of the United States, applauded the state's efforts to further restrict snake hunting but said the group would like to see roundups ended.
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