When Rattlesnakes Don’t Rattle Anymore

This is an ecological and a metaphorically sociological and political look at the silencing of a rattle.

Each year in March, in a place called Sweetwater, Texas is the world’s largest rattlesnake round up, sponsored by the local Jaycees. Round up is, of course, a euphemism for mass killing of the snakes.  “Harvesting” would have been another euphemism.  It is a festival of sort – complete with a parade and a beauty contest for Snake Charmer of the year, carnival rides and a cook fest as well. The latter features the many ways a rattler can be prepared and cooked. This has gone on since 1958, I read, and apparently it is regulated in a way so that the rattlesnake population is hardly affected in an adverse way as to have caused a rodent population explosion which would be a bad thing.  I am not sure though if such a study has been made at all.  It is a fund raising event that benefits several civic projects but we’re told that the biggest benefit is in the collection of venom.  Not only does that provide a healthy supply of antidote for rattlesnake bite, there is ongoing research on other benefits from snake venom.  Foremost of the benefits is snake venom’s usefulness in fighting cancer cells and ability to control or mitigate the effects of tumor.

Why think about this at all? The average person will have no qualm with the snake round up.  Certainly the snakes are by themselves a public relations nightmare for anyone who will try to take up their cause, let alone find even a few sympathizers among the public.  Snakes are far from being photogenic and the flicking tongue does not present a pretty picture.  Dogs are still cute even with their drooling tongues hanging out and slobbering profusely but a snake that samples the air with its tongue to catch minute traces of airborne molecules and then swiping them at the roof of their mouth where the information is “read” with pinpoint accuracy is still a sinister look. We must understand that for a creature that has no legs or arms to hold anything close to its nose this is a superior adaptive ability. Yet, among hunters who must walk the fields on a hunt, snakes are as much a target as the prey they’re looking for.  Animal Rights activists may say something but given a choice they’d rather be defending guinea pigs and rats and other experimented-on animals than speak up on behalf of snakes.  Therefore, I will.

First, why does a rattlesnake rattle?  Like many venomous snakes these reptiles do provide warnings to animals which are not their prey or animals they cannot eat or don’t want to.  And venomous snakes that are without the ability to make noise advertise their presence instead in a different way - that is by having loud and bright colorful skin.  Coral snakes, certain vipers and tree snakes are good examples.  Typically non-venomous snakes are bland or have darker coloration.  Interestingly, certain non-venomous snakes pretend to be one by having colorful skin also as a survival adaptation so other creatures will leave them alone or keep their distance.  Poisonous frogs also warn with very bright colorful skin.  The rattle is mistaken by humans as a provocation whereas animals take it for what it is - a warning - and they stay away.  And remember that when a rattler is stalking a rat it is completely silent.

Venom to the snake is a resource it would rather not waste on anything it cannot eat.  It takes a lot for the snake to produce venom so it conserves it whenever it can. And often snakes would rather retreat than confront us and it is a last resort to strike at anything they do not wish to kill and eat.

Now then, when do rattlesnakes no longer rattle?  The story may surprise you.  Naturalists just recently discovered that in places where rattlers are heavily hunted, i.e. for the round up, there was eerie silence instead of the familiar sounds that typically betray the presence of the snakes.  Needless to say, the pickings were slim at these places but there was evidence that rattle snakes were present.  What rattle snakes they caught by sight had fused rattlers that no longer rattle.  The rattles are ring-like keratin tissues (similar material like finger nails or claws) that develop at their tails every time the snake sheds its skin. The rings are connected loosely to each other and when the snake shakes its tail we would hear the familiar rattle.  Some of the rattlers have these appendage atrophied because of a genetic mutation.  The snakes that do not rattle escape detection from the hunters and collectors and there lies the multiplying effect.  As the loud rattlers get caught the silent ones thrive and go on to pass their genes that are inherited by subsequent generations.  Soon we have silent venomous snakes.

We are now told that worse than a spine tingling sound of a rattler nearby is no sound at all.  We no longer benefit from the natural warning.  The rattlesnakes have become silent but are still equipped to defend themselves by striking at anything that threatens them.  It is another one of those unintended consequences that we put upon nature to resolve.  By the way, snake population around the world had been steadily declining that mystifies herpetologists (fancy way to call people who study snakes) who are not able to explain it.  There is, however, an exception in the case of the Burmese python explosive population growth in the Everglades in Florida and black snakes in Hawaii and Guam.  In this case, it is more about a combination of the lack of natural predators to control the snakes and because they are alien species to the habitat their prey is not equipped to identify or avoid them.  The Burmese pythons apparently were released by pet owners when the snakes got too big; the black snakes hitchhiked on airplanes to Guam and Hawaii.

The ecological lesson is that once we tamper with the eco-system by systematically going after either prey or predator the consequence is catastrophic to the health of wild life in general and sometimes to the environment, such as the case of the destructive changes in water systems and wetlands and flooding when beavers were hunted down uncontrollably for their fur early in history.  Anecdotally we hear stories when snakes were hunted down to near extinction in some places that resulted in the rapid population explosion of rats.  Rice and grain production from the field and at granaries was so adversely affected by the rampaging rats the people suffered as well.

Now we have a moral lesson – a metaphor of a sort in social and political discourse.  One of democracy’s most important attribute is freedom of speech.  It is because a democracy works when all sides are heard, discussed and decided upon by the people.  It ceases to be one when a monolithic voice takes over because that almost always happens when the government turns into a dictatorship that strives to silence any and all opposition.  It comes either from the persecution of the press or the press becoming an ally to restricting the voices of dissent with the aim towards the final eradication of anyone who opposes the prevailing ideology.  It works badly for either side of opposing ideologies when one tries to suppress the other’s ability to express.

Today, however, the silencing of opposing ideas is done more subtly.  It is done with what seems like an innocuous activity, even with the appearance of reasonableness.  It is called extreme political correctness.  It used to be an effective method to discourage racial slurs and sexual harassment, which was fine.  Unfortunately, it is now being used to silence anyone who speaks with dissenting opinions.

It has become a force now that the liberals employ with impunity against conservatives and conservative ideas.  Of course, it could also work the other way around but today universities and the political arena are fraught with it. Ms. Condoleezza Rice was forced to cancel a speech at Rutgers University because of protests from students. It marked the beginning of the silencing of opposing views that are contrary to those who profess another. It has now recently evolved into student power that is powerful enough to force a university president to step down and this movement is now escalating in many places of learning.  A symposium on free speech at Yale was disrupted by a student whose own ability to exercise free speech allowed him to at least temporarily stopped the discussions.  The mainstream media also has become an effective purveyor of political correctness and often against conservatism.

When one ideology prevails lopsidedly over another the danger is that the latter will lose its ability to rattle.  The silence will have serious repercussions.  A monolithic society or government will always turn into an indivisibly and inflexibly oppressive aggregation of people when reason and dissenting voices are diminished if not entirely silenced.  That is a dangerous condition.  Whoever is in power must be aware that silence does not mean the demise of an opposition.  It must understand that it is easier when opposing voices are heard – not just for the logical reasons – because that is the best way to understand and know them and perchance to work with them (one can only wish).  Worse than hearing the opposition is the silence that percolates underneath.  History teaches us that political power changes hands, dictatorships are toppled and ideologies change or evolve   even amidst every effort to silence the opposition.  Worse than hearing too much out of the political and sociological discourse is when one side no longer rattles.

As a footnote, in the Genesis story it was not a snake that tempted Eve.  The snake will tell us it does not have prehensile hands, let alone any appendage, to hold a fruit (and it was not an apple either), to entice Eve.  It is also untrue that Viking helmets had horns on them.  It started when a very imaginative costume director decided to put horns on Viking helmets in the first Wagnerian operas.  Since then even female opera singers in cartoons are almost always depicted wearing horned helmets.  Any Viking worth his salted beard would have had no use for horns on his helmet that would only have added extra weight and a hindrance during battle.