03: A Gather of Gatherings: A Rhumba of Rattlesnakes – Reckonings and Rhythms

What do you call a group of rattlesnakes? A rhumba.
And what do you call a podcast episode that blends snake encounters, medieval language, legendary women, and the soulful beat of an Afro-Cuban dance? This one.

In this immersive episode of A Gather of Gatherings, host Kellie Raines waltzes past fear (and a few fangs) with expert Amy Brumbaugh from Save the Snakes, who introduces her to her very first live rattlesnake. Along the way, you’ll learn how to safely coexist with these often-misunderstood creatures — and why they’re more percussionist than predator.

But this isn’t just about wildlife conservation. It’s about language, legend, and transformation. Discover the bizarre and brilliant history of collective nouns, hear from the legendary Dame Juliana Berners (kinda) in a time-traveling, totally fictional interview, and more.

Woven throughout: poetic reflections on what it means to shed your skin — literally, metaphorically, and maybe even musically.

Rattlesnakes. Resistance. Renaissance. Ready to dance?

💬 What’s your favorite collective noun?
Tag us or message @gatherofgatherings on Instagram and TikTok and use the hashtag #AGatherOfGatherings — we want to hear your favorites! 

🎶 Music, sound design, and full credits in the show notes.
🎙️ To learn more, visit gatherofgatherings.com

⭐ If you enjoyed the episode, please rate and review it — help us dance more!

Show Notes

Host, Producer, Writer: Kellie Raines

Interviewees

• Amy Brumbaugh, Venomous Snake Coordinator of Save the Snakes
• Dame Juliana Berners, portrayed by Kelley Ogden (fictional interview)
• Shawn B O'Neal

When I Shed My Skin… (in order of appearance)

• Margaret Morneau
• Elaine Brooks
• Tory Scroggins
• Andrew Fowler*
• Gay Cooper
• Johnathan Sexton
• Damon Alums
• Marilyn Raines
• Kellie Raines
• Rose Froling

*Wrote their own “When I Shed My Skin…” vignette

Special Thanks

Amy Brumbaugh, Save the Snakes, Shawn O’Neal, Margaret Morneau

Music

Music courtesy of Melodie Music.

Melodie Music Subscription: Pro Plan, Lifetime

Title: Acoustic Minor Swing Artist — Bill Palmer; Composer: Palmer William John
https://melod.ie/track-details/1647-acoustic-minor-swing 

Title: Of Lads and Lasses — Alex Cap; Composer: Cap Alexander Stephen
https://melod.ie/track-details/450-of-lads-and-lasses 

Title: Who Will Pay the Piper — Vincent Russo; Composer: Russo John
https://melod.ie/track-details/2297-who-will-pay-the-piper 

Title: Especial — Jared Chance Taylor; Composer: Taylor Jared Chance
https://melod.ie/track-details/3507-especial 

Title: Dead Broke — Chris Raggatt; Composer: Raggatt Chris
https://melod.ie/track-details/2423-dead-broke 

Sound Effects
SoundSnap (pro subscription)

Referenced Resources or Links

Save the Snakes

https://savethesnakes.org/

The Rattlesnake Conservancy
https://www.savethebuzztails.org/ 

Chapters

• 3:33 Snake Room Tour & First Rattlesnake Encounter
• 6:59 Kellie Meets a Rattlesnake in Person (Sound Up!)
• 14:13 Collective Noun Origins: Medieval Wordplay
• 16:10 Part 2 of the Interview with Amy Brumbaugh and the Mission of Save the Snakes
• 1:03:36 Dame Juliana Berners (Time-Traveling 15th-Century Nun) Returns
• 1:09:20 Shawn, Quicksand, and Rattlesnakes
• 1:14:22 Rattlesnake Kate and Signs
• 1:16:01 Thanks, Gatherlings, GatherStrands

Transcript

Kellie: What would you do if you encountered a rattlesnake conducting its own percussion? What if you stumbled upon a whole marching band of them? Believe it or not, some folks don't run. They dance right along with them. Welcome back to A Gather of Gatherings, where we celebrate the quirky quadrilles of collective nouns and why a single word can unlock a whole universe of wonder.

Kellie: Hi there. I'm Kellie, your curious conductor. Let us tiptoe into the fear, folklore, and facts that have cast rattlesnakes as one of nature's villains. Sure. A dash of dread keeps us on our toes and safe, but we will dance past the fright and discover how these coiled choristers keep our world in tune.

Kellie: This is A Rhumba of Rattlesnakes, a slithering soiree of scales, suspense, and sly semantics. We will meet Amy Brumbaugh of Save the Snakes in California. She introduced me to my very first rattlesnake. I have goosebumps every time I think about it. Amy is a venomous snake expert and has a treasure trove of venom-vaulted wisdom to share with us.

Amy: When people think of a rattlesnake and the rattle that it produces, they think of maracas a lot of time, right? Because a maraca can create that kind of sound. However, a lot of people don't know that the way that the rattle is produced is from interlocking segments of the rattle. So, the rattle itself is just keratinized tissue, so it's like fingernails and every time they shed another segment is added to the rattle. 

Kellie: Let us hip sway through more chapters of collective noun history for all of the word nerds out there, like me. And, via our secret sauce, all-too-fake digital time-travel device, we welcome back Dame Juliana Berners, early collective noun wrangler extraordinaire, for her medieval musings on rattlesnakes and more.

Dame Juliana Berners: The only serpents we knew wore velvet and ambition and did their whispering behind cloaks and bibles. Shh. Don't tell anyone I said that. I'm still unclear on the jurisdiction for time-traveling podcast confessions back to the rattle at hand. I've made myself acquainted with these curvy ground ripples.

Dame Juliana Berners: This rattling, reptile coiled like a question mark with fangs is both poet and warning bell. I admire it. 

Kellie: So, let's step, slide, step into the light with these molting marvels and perhaps catch a glimpse of our own metamorphosis. 

Margaret: When I shed my skin, the earth reminded me… I wasn't put here to stay still, I am made for dancing, breaking boundaries, and the occasional resurrection, preferably with good lighting and broken-in dance shoes.

Kellie: What happens when we cast off yesterday's masks to make room for tomorrow's truths? Shall we dance? Let's rhumba to the beat of some rattlesnakes. 

Elaine: When I shed my skin, it tickles. 

Kellie: So, we're at Save the Snakes in, is it Rancho Cordova or Sacramento? 

Amy: Yeah, I think technically Rancho Cordova. 

Kellie: Rancho Cordova.

Amy: Yeah. 

Kellie: And can you state your name for us? 

Amy: My name is Amy Brumbaugh. 

Kellie: Amy, you're gonna give me a tour, right? 

Amy: Yes. 

Kellie: Okay! 

Amy: Yes… 

Kellie: Let's start– 

Amy: You just walked in the door, and you were greeted by our snake room. So, as people come in, uh, the first thing they see is our lovely snake room. So, these are all of our snake ambassador animals.

Amy: So, we have a collection of about 25 individual snakes here, and we have many that are non-venomous. And we also have six that are venomous snakes here. So, all of the venomous snakes are rattlesnakes. They're all also California natives. So, we have four of our northern Pacific rattlesnake, which is a type of rattlesnake that you would find here in Sacramento.

Amy: And in most of Northern California. And then we have our western diamondback rattlesnake who you… we can describe for your listeners, but his name is Johnny Cash. 

Kellie: Is he the one that's down here? 

Amy: He's the one that's looking at us. He's… he's coiled up, he is resting comfortably right now, but he is looking right at us. He's very alert and aware when there are visitors. 

Kellie: Okay. 

Amy: Um, and he's our biggest, so the western diamondback is found in the southern part of California and their range extends into Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, and down into Mexico. Um, they're a really iconic species that you would find in like old Western movies.

Kellie: Wow. Okay. 

Amy: So anytime you think of like John Wayne movies, there's a rattlesnake with his tail buzzing. It's likely a western diamondback rattlesnake. 

Kellie: So, it's an iconic kind of Hollywood standard. 

Amy: Definitely– Yes. Iconic Hollywood snake species. 

Kellie: Okay. 

Amy: Um, and Johnny Cash is kind of a local, uh, celebrity. He was kept as a pet for nine years in Folsom.

Kellie: People keep rattlesnakes as pets. 

Amy: Uh, they do, yeah. 

Kellie: Okay. 

Amy: Some, some people do it. It… it wouldn't be my preferred thing to do to keep a rattlesnake as a pet. There's uh, definitely a lot of risk involved. 

Kellie: Yeah. 

Amy: So, some of our animals here were former pets, and their owners could no longer care for them. 

Kellie: Okay. 

Amy: Um, and so we took them in, gave them a forever home and, now they help… help us to teach people about snakes and about snake safety. So, I have a rattlesnake in a bucket here to show you… if you would like to see. 

Kellie: I would love to see one. Let me get my camera ready, if that's okay. 

Amy: Of course. Um, so I will just, we're gonna wanna keep as much distance as possible. Um, from the bucket, about three feet is probably good. 

Kellie: Is this good for me? 

Amy: Yeah, you're totally good there. 

Kellie: Okay. 

Amy: Um, this is Tesoro, who's in the bucket here. 

Kellie: Okay. 

Amy: And you'll notice that I am using my safety gear. So, I've got gaiters to protect my feet, and I'm going to be using tools to open the bucket and to maneuver the snake.

Kellie: Okay. 

Amy: So, we never touch rattlesnakes with our hands here. 

Kellie: Never. 

Amy: Never, ever. Um, not when we're working with them, bringing 'em outta the buckets and such. In certain scenarios, if you're doing like medical procedures… 

Kellie: Yeah. 

Amy: You might do a procedure called tubing, which is… different procedure, which we're not gonna do today.

Kellie: Okay. 

Amy: That would be the only time I would put my hands on– 

Kellie: No tubing. Okay. 

Amy: No tubing today. 

Kellie: And what is the snake's name? 

Amy: The snake's name is Tesoro. 

Kellie: Tesoro. 

Amy: Mm-hmm. Means treasure. 

Kellie: Treasure. 

Amy: So… 

Kellie: Oh, my goodness. 

Amy: I've got her in the bucket there. Tesoro's a little bit on the shy side. 

Kellie: That's okay. I'm good with Tesoro being shy.

Kellie: I'm totally fine with that. 

 (rattlesnake noise)

Amy: There it is. 

Kellie: Holy moly. That is musical. That is a dance. 

Amy: Sorry. Sweet girl. 

Kellie: Oh, my lord.

Amy: Hey, baby. 

Kellie: No way.

Kellie: No way. No way. No no no no no way. 

Amy: There she is. 

Kellie: Hi, you beautiful. Beautiful. So beautiful. 

Amy: You can see she's calmed down a little bit now. 

Kellie: Oh, sure. 

Amy: She's not rattling anymore. She's very alert, but I'm just gonna put her back into her house. You're welcome to– 

Kellie: I think that's a great idea. 

Amy: You can take a… you can come around the corner taking photos.

Amy: Just right back in here, little lady. There you go, sweetness. Put the tail in, baby. There we go. 

Kellie: What? You are like a magician. 

Amy: I'm just gonna lock her back up so she's all safe and sound.

Kellie: Tesoro. 

Amy: There we go. 

Kellie: Tesora? Tesoro? 

Amy: Uh, Tesoro. T-E-S-O-R-O. 

Kellie: Hi. I'm sorry, baby. 

Amy: Did you get some photos? 

Kellie: I got some great photos. 

Amy: Oh, good. 

Kellie: And some great audio. 

Amy: Yeah. 

Kellie: Oh, my goodness. 

Amy: Yeah. Now that's a sound... 

Kellie: Do you ever get tired of that sound? 

Amy: No. No. I don't, I don't think I ever get tired of that sound. I also never feel fully complacent around that sound.

Kellie: Yeah. 

Amy: Um, so one thing that's, that's extremely important to myself and us as an organization is safety. And so, there are certain safety procedures we follow with every single interaction with a rattlesnake. Um, and so we're, we never wanna be complacent because you run the risk of making a mistake if you become complacent or you're rushing, or– 

Kellie: For sure. 

Amy: –you skip a step. So, safety is number one priority with… with these animals. 

Kellie: So, as she's rattling, is she just saying, “Hey, you're bothering me. Get away.” 

Amy: She's scared. 

Kellie: She's scared. 

Amy: Yeah. 

Kellie: Yeah. 

Amy: She's scared. She's one of our more shy rattlesnakes. 

Kellie: Oh, bless her heart. 

Amy: She tends to spend more of her time kind of hiding away in her little hides that we offer them. Some of the rattlesnakes that we have hardly ever rattle. 

Kellie: Okay. 

Amy: Dorado here. 

Kellie: Dorado? 

Amy: He… he rarely rattles. Um… 

Kellie: Oh, he's a tiny little guy. 

Amy: Yeah, he’s uh… he's actually pretty big. He's big enough. He's bigger than Tesoro that you saw there. He's just, you can only see his, his face there. And then we have Mr. Cool down here. He's another one who's a little bit on the shy side. 

Kellie: His name's Mr. Cool? 

Amy: Mr. Cool. He's… he's from Cool, California. 

Kellie: I love that. That's so fitting. 

Amy: Dorado was found in the El Dorado Hills area. 

Kellie: Oh, I love that. 

Amy: And then we have Lucky Strike, who, she was out earlier, but she's hiding now.

(rattlesnake sound)

Kellie: Psst. Craving more serpentine secrets? Dive into our Gatherlings miniseries with episode 2.5, Snake Sampler in your podcast app for Amy's full Save the Snakes backstage tour. Meet Orlando, the eastern indigo snake. He is gorgeous. Athena, the coastal carpet python. She is a goddess. And Osma the rhino rat snake. All kinds of personality there. Consider it your all-access scale pass, including non-rattlesnake badassery and more at Save the Snakes. Don't miss a slither. Wink wink. 

Amy: So, snakes will shed their skin and when they shed their skin, um, they shed it all in one piece. And so we like to give them a break when they're in that process of shedding.

Amy: But when a snake is about to shed, its eyes will kind of cloud over. And that is the, uh, they're producing like a lymph fluid to help them to assist with sliding out of that skin. 

Kellie: Oh, how fascinating. 

Amy: And because the eyes are not, they do not have eyelids, so you'll never see a snake blink. 

Kellie: Constantly open. 

Amy: Or wink.

Amy: They're constantly open. So that's a scale also that covers the eye for protection. 

Kellie: So, they sleep with their eyes open? 

Amy: Mm-hmm. 

Kellie: Wow. 

Amy: Yeah. Is that so that snake and Harry Potter never could have winked at him?

(rattlesnake sound)

Tory: When I shed my skin, I did it slowly. Deliberate. Every layer a memory. Every breath a promise. I wasn't escaping. I was revealing. 

Kellie: Don't wander off. I've got more snake talk with Amy coming up. She introduced me to not only my first rattlesnake, but a few other slidy sensuous creatures reminding me how fear can give way to wonder when curiosity leads the way.

Kellie: And with that, as we peel back our own layers, we unearth new stories, new inspirations, fresh curiosities — some tucked into the hidden corners of our hearts or our gardens, or wherever we hide those primal secret things. Now, let's glide our way back through time for a quick tour of how we even ended up calling groups of animals by such vivid names. Gather round, word lovers. It's story time. 

(sound of a book page turning)

Drew: When I shed my skin, it wasn't dramatic. No fireworks, no applause. Just a quiet morning and a version of me that didn't fit anymore. Too small, too careful, too much about someone else. So, I stepped out, not because I knew who I was, but because I finally knew who I wasn't, and that was enough to start.

(sound of a book page turning)

(sound of a jazzy trumpet)

Kellie: A quick disclaimer or claim, whatever you wanna call it, while I do my best historical sleuthing… remember, history is sometimes a slippery snake, always shedding its skin, and I'm just charming the serpent here, not claiming absolute historical gospel, but if I get it right, hey, go me. Do your own research. Always. For anything in life.

Kellie: Read books, ask questions, do experiments to test what you've learned. Read more books. Listen to some of your favorite podcasts. Let this be the starting point for your curiosity. And you go forth and discover your world. Our tale, we think, begins in medieval England. We're talking knights, castles, and questionable hygiene.

Kellie: It was fashionable then for noble folks to showcase their education by rattling off elaborate lists of hunting terms. These terms were so specific, they even described animals most people never got close enough to see clearly, like lions, bears, and yes, snakes. Oh my. Now, while rattlesnakes weren't found in medieval England, the land certainly had its share of curvy reptiles, especially adders, which even made an appearance in the famous Boke of St. Albans about how they were useful in falconry practices. Podcast footnote — check out our first episode about, you guessed it, falconry.

(sound of a hawk screeching)

Kellie: Imagine your local medieval Lord confidently declaring a murder of crows or a fall of woodcocks. 

Medieval Lord: Behold, a murder of crows, a fall of woodcocks! 

Kellie: It was a status symbol proving you were in the know… part of an exclusive club, fluent in animal group lingo. These lists became so popular. They leapt from hunting manuals into poetry, literature, and eventually our dictionaries cementing their place in modern lingo. From medieval lords to this very podcast, naming animal gatherings has always been about sharing knowledge and adding a dash of flare and fun.

Kellie: But now it's time to return to my conversation with Amy. In part two, she'll take us behind the scenes at Save the Snakes, showing how today's stewards not only care for these creatures, but also keep us safe. 

Gay: When I shed my skin, I left it under the olive tree. (giggle) Let the wind take what I no longer needed.

Kellie: Amy, thank you so much. Um, so we are at Save the Snakes in Rancho Cordova, California. Can you tell us the story behind Save the Snakes, its origins, its mission, its goals, and uh, what it hopes to achieve? 

Amy: Absolutely. So, Save the Snakes was founded in 2017, and, uh, the mission is to conserve snake populations around the world while also, um, eliminating human-snake conflict.

Amy: The way that we obtain those goals is through education, community outreach, and by supporting our conservation partners around the world. We have had partners in Nepal working with king cobra conservation, so not only studying the, uh, the populations of king cobras in Nepal, but by also doing king cobra rescues, getting them out of people's homes away from places where maybe we don't want king cobras to be so close to people, rescuing them, relocating them to a safe distance, and also educating the community about snake safety.

Amy: Uh, so that's a really exciting project that we have, uh, funded with our conservation partner, his name is Kamal Devkota. We have, uh, another project in South Africa that's ongoing at the Hoedspruit Reptile Center. And so, our other employee, Hiral Naik, works at that center and she focuses on education and outreach in the community.

Amy: Uh, working together with communities to bring snake bite safety information, uh, snake awareness education to try to help keep communities safe. And then another one that we have in Brazil, we have Jane Oliveira, who's been working with this very rare end of... very restricted to this one island, this species of snake, which is a Bothrops sazimai.

Amy: Uh, not a lot was known about this snake. Is only found on that island. And we're able to support her conservation project to try to learn more about this snake. How many are there, how do they live, where are they? Um, and she was able to start her project there through our grant program. 

Kellie: That is so cool. And what an effort to create this worldwide network and partnership with all of these different people. That's amazing. 

Amy: Yeah. So, we feel very passionately about, um, empowering people in their own communities. I am not an expert on snakes in South Africa. I'm not an expert on snakes in Nepal, so it would not be very helpful for me as a Save the Snakes person to go out and try to teach about these, these kinds of snakes.

Amy: So, we locate people who are experts in their own communities, passionate conservationists, um, passionate about helping snakes and also helping people so that we elevate their work. We provide them with funding, financial support to get their projects going, uh, so that they can go out and do the work. So, we're more of like a seed providing like seed grants to conservationists all around the world.

Kellie: 'Cause there's nothing really more important than understanding the local community and nature and ecosystem to really help it. 

Amy: Exactly. They're gonna have needs, um, that we're, we're not gonna know about or be able to meet. But the people in their community can meet those needs and can… can really help with that.

Kellie: And who is the founder of Save the Snakes? 

Amy: The founder of Save the Snakes is Michael Starkey. So, he is a wildlife biologist and passionate snake conservationist, um, based out of Sacramento here. 

Kellie: So, your role at Save the Snakes, you're the venomous snake coordinator– 

Amy: Mm-hmm. 

Kellie: Correct? 

Kellie: And so how does your background and experience and passion help you with what Save the Snakes is doing worldwide?

Amy: Yeah. So worldwide, we've got the grant program, locally here in California, we also have snakes, and we also have snake-human conflict. Michael and Save the Snakes saw that there was a need to bring snake awareness, snake safety awareness, and snake bite education to our community here in California. So, in 2022, the Snake Conservation Center was opened, and we have all of our snake ambassadors that live here at the center.

Amy: Um, part of my job is to take care of them, so we need our ambassadors to help us to fulfill our mission of educating people about snakes and snake safety. There's nothing like meeting a snake in person to really teach about snakes. It just really helps people to get that one-on-one connection. 

Kellie: What are the biggest challenges that Save the Snakes is having as far as protecting ecosystems, incorporating snakes safely with humans?

Amy: Right. I think it's right there in the name. We're trying to save the snakes. Which is generally not a very popular animal to try to save. If we were Save the Panda Bears, you know, we could probably, you know, get a lot of people on board with that very easily. So it is… it's a difficult animal to encourage people to want to save.

Kellie: And why should people wanna save them? What are we saving snakes from? 

Amy: A lot of things. Um, first though, I want to acknowledge that snakes definitely do pose a threat to human health and human safety around the world. There’s 2.7 million dangerous snake bites annually, and the World Health Organization declared snake bite a neglected tropical disease in 2017.

Amy: So that's also why we were founded in 2017, because when an animal is causing disease and suffering, what do we as humans… what's our natural reaction? We want to eradicate that animal, right? To eradicate the suffering. Um, so we don't want human suffering. We don't want human deaths. We don't want people to be bitten by venomous snakes and be disabled or, you know, die from snake bite.

Amy: So that's why Save the Snakes was founded, um, to provide resources also to help with this issue of snake bite. It is definitely something we want to acknowledge that snakes can pose a threat to people, but at the same time, they're extremely important for the environment. This right there is kind of the crux of the challenge is that snakes are an animal that can be very dangerous for people, and we never wanna downplay that because it is a real risk.

Amy: However, snakes are also crucially important in pretty much every environment that they're in. 

Kellie: Can you explain why they're important to our ecosystem? 

Amy: So, snakes are, uh, widespread throughout the globe. There are about 3,600 different species of snakes. 

Kellie: That many? 

Amy: Around the world. Yeah. So, they're, they're everywhere.

Kellie: Okay. 

Amy: Except for Antarctica. No snakes there. 

Kellie: Rattlesnakes range from southern Canada down to northern Patagonia, but you'll never spot one on Antarctica's ice. On purpose. As cold-blooded creatures, they need outside heat, basking in sunshine or snuggling warm rocks, aww, to power every rattle and coil.

Kellie: Antarctica routinely plummets way below freezing like way, way, way, way below. So even the boldest rhumba of rattlesnakes would be shaking more than, I don't know, say a cat startled by a cucumber in your favorite viral video. 

Amy: Snakes have really been very successful all over the globe. And they're, uh, predators.

Amy: So, they're obligate carnivores. They have to eat meat. They can't be vegetarian. So, they are predators. They're sometimes, sometimes they are the apex predator in an ecosystem. And if an apex predator is eliminated from the environment, then the rest of the food web will collapse. Conversely, snakes are also kind of prey in certain areas.

Kellie: Okay. 

Amy: So, they're really very important for all different kinds of ecosystem health. 

Kellie: What kind of animals prey on rattlesnakes and what kind of things do rattlesnakes prey on? Do you know? 

Amy: So, yeah. So, rattlesnakes are prey for king snakes. 

Kellie: Okay. 

Amy: As well as birds of prey. So, like hawks, raptors, uh, coyotes, um, bobcats.

Amy: And humans. So, humans are also a predator of rattlesnakes. So, they're an important food source for many of those animals. Rattlesnakes are eating things like small mammals like mice, rats, squirrels, and this is one of the areas where they're providing ecosystem services for humans because those animals that I just mentioned — the mice, the rats — can carry diseases that people can catch. 

Kellie: For sure.

Amy: With, uh, snakes around, we have a free form of pest control. They also, surprisingly, are seed dispersers. 

Kellie: What does that mean? 

Amy: So, rattlesnakes are eating these animals that are eating seeds, and as they're digesting, uh, some of the seeds will go undigested. And as they move about in their environment and they're pooping out the seeds, they're dispersing and helping to populate plants. 

Kellie: They're making flowers grow.

Amy: Mm-hmm. 

Kellie: So, thank you snakes for the flowers that is so, you know, circle of life and web, I think biodiversity and the more we learn about our ecosystems and how things work, the more we can respect it and protect it and ourselves. 

Amy: Yeah. Another thing that, um, rattlesnakes specifically as well as other venomous snakes are… are doing, that helps with human health that a lot of people don't think about is the potential for, um, medicinal uses of venom.

Kellie: Oh, really? 

Amy: Yeah. So, there's actually, uh, a lot of studies being done on different venoms. Venom is a really complex like cocktail of proteins, peptides, enzymes, and venom works by attacking different parts of the body. So, some venoms might work on the blood, some venoms might work on the nervous system.

Amy: Different components work in different ways in the body of the injected animal. 

Kellie: So, when we say rattlesnakes are a venomous snake, or any snake that's venomous, that's because they have venom or do all snakes have venom? 

Amy: Not all snakes have venom. Rattlesnakes have venom. A lot more snakes than we realized do have venom, but only about 600 of the 3,600 that I mentioned have venom that is medically significant for people, meaning a lot of the snakes that we keep as pets, like hognose snakes technically have venom, but their venom is not effective or dangerous for people. We can discover a lot of potential medicinal uses. Out of, um, isolating different components of venom. And in fact, they have made medicines for people based off of snake venoms.

Kellie: Really? Not just like anti-venom if you get bit by a snake? 

Amy: Anti-venom is a big one that we need venomous snakes for– 

Kellie: Yeah. 

Amy: Um, to produce anti-venom. But there... have, they have made medicines that are being used right now, um, to treat different kinds of things. So, like heart disease, diabetes, um, I know there's some cancer research going on right now with venoms.

Amy: If you, uh, specific example is Captopril is a medicine that was based off of a component in snake venom. 

Kellie: I have goosebumps just because I'm learning so many cool things from you. That is amazing. Oh, my goodness.

Amy: As the human population is growing, humans are… are you know, spreading throughout more of the world. And we're, we're building more and more into snake habitat. In California specifically, since we're talking about rattlesnakes, there is about 10 different species, subspecies of rattlesnakes that are native here.

Amy: Uh, one of them is threatened and is a species of special concern in California, and that is the very beautiful red diamond rattlesnake. 

Kellie: Oh no… 

Amy: We don't have one here. But if you look up a photo of the red diamond rattlesnake, you'll see why they're called that. There's beautiful shade of like kind of a rusty orangy red.

Amy: Kinda a medium-sized rattlesnake, but their habitat is in Southern California, coastal habitat. So, it is prime real estate. 

Kellie: Yeah. 

Amy: Uh, so people have been encroaching into their habitat, building in their habitat, and so they're, they're definitely struggling because of human development into their habitat.

Kellie: Oh, that's unfortunate and scary. So that kind of segues into a lot of people are afraid of rattlesnakes, rightfully so, because they are dangerous. How does Save the Snakes work to change public perceptions and encourage safety and knowledge of how to protect themselves and the snakes? 

Amy: So, I think one of the most important things for us to remember is that the fear of snakes is not wholly unfounded.

Amy: It is… it is definitely something that is valid in, in a lot of ways for a lot of people, um, both locally and globally. I mentioned there's 2.7 million envenomations a year. So, we're very respectful of those fears and very empathetic to the fears that people have with snakes. That being said, we don't want to make their fears any worse, and we feel that knowledge is power and knowledge of how to stay safe around snakes is very empowering.

Amy: So, we… we approach these fears with great compassion and with the, the goal of giving people the information they need to stay safe. Right? Because we have a lot of risks that we encounter all the time in our lives in… we just get in a car and go outside. You know, it's very dangerous to drive a car. 

Kellie: Mm-hmm.

Amy: You're more likely to get in a car cash than you are to be bit by a rattlesnake in California. 

Kellie: And how do you go about this education? Do you, do you go out to outreach events? Do you hold classes? What kinds of things do you do to get the information out and train people? 

Amy: Yeah, all of the above really. So, we have a couple of big, uh, outreach events.

Amy: So, we, every year we have our annual Sacramento Snake Fest, which is a free family friendly public event. It's usually held here in Rancho Cordova, um, usually in the springtime. So that is a place where, uh, not only us, but other entities will come out and present about snakes. And we have snakes at the event.

Amy: And it's a whole day to celebrate and learn about snakes. We also will do public outreach. So we'll go to schools, we'll go to community centers. Anywhere where we're invited, where we can come and talk about snakes. We have a whole presentation, um, that we bring with information about the types of snakes that we have here in California.

Amy: Uh, how to identify them, biological facts about them, how to stay safe around rattlesnakes and what to do in the event of a bite. And then we also have our venomous, uh, training courses that we hold here at the Snake Conservation Center. 

Kellie: Tell me about that. So, what is the day like for somebody who takes that class?

Amy: Yeah, so we have our level one venomous snake, uh, handling course. It's a certification course. So, this course was actually developed by our partner, The Rattlesnake Conservancy. And they're based out of Florida. 

Kellie: Okay. 

Amy: They developed this course because there was a… a lack of really standardized way of teaching people how to work with rattlesnakes.

Amy: If you worked in a zoo like I did for many years, most people learn how to work with venomous snakes from a mentor in a zoo setting. You get whatever habits your mentor had, you get whatever knowledge they had. Similarly, if you're a biologist and you get hired by a consulting firm or by the state to go out, they hand you a hook and a bucket and they go, you're the snake person now. You may have to, on the fly, just figure out how to get a snake off of a job site or out of the way of a bulldozer. So, there was this kind of gap in education regarding how to work with venomous snakes. We specifically focus on rattlesnakes because that's what we have here. So the Rattlesnake Conservancy developed this training.

Amy: The course is taught over a weekend usually. So, it's a two-day course. It's a comprehensive course. The first day is all in the classroom. So, this room that we're sitting in right here, tables and chairs, big kinda warehouse building, and we focus on California snakes and California rattlesnakes because that's where we are.

Amy: So, we cover snake biology, ecology, California snakes, how to identify them. We go into toxinology. So, we talk a lot about venoms and how complex they are, which is really fascinating to me, but can get a little scientifically in the weeds. Uh, we talk about anti-venom production. Um, and then really important topics for our participants, which is snake bite safety, snake bite first aid.

Amy: So, what do you do in the event of a snake bite? 

Kellie: What do you do in the event of a snake bite? 

Amy: In California, we are very fortunate of all 10 different types of rattlesnakes that we have here, they're all treated with the same anti-venom. 

Kellie: Okay. 

Amy: So really in all of North America, if you're bit by any different type of rattlesnake, you get the same anti-venom.

Amy: So, you don't need to try to kill the snake or definitely don't bring it into the ER. They don't wanna see the rattlesnake there. If you know it was a rattlesnake, that's good enough, you don't, you don't really have to try to identify it too much. So, get away from the snake, number one. If you are bitten, call 911.

Amy: Call poison control. Because poison control is responsible for getting anti-venom to the hospital that you're gonna be going to. 

Kellie: Okay, so the hospitals don't like keep it on stock? 

Amy: It depends. It may vary. So, in California we only have maybe 300 to 800 venomous snake bites in a year, which for almost 40 million people is not actually that that much.

Kellie: Yeah. 

Amy: So, a hospital may or may not see a lot of snake bite and anti-venom does expire. 

Kellie: Okay. I was gonna ask that.

Amy: And it's very expensive, so it may not be logical for a hospital that doesn't see a lot of snake bite to keep it on site, but they can get it to the hospital that you're going to, which is why it's important to call poison control.

Amy: And you never wanna drive yourself to the hospital. Uh, you wanna have emergency services come to you. They can also start like pre-hospital management for you. Get an IV started, things of that nature. So, step number one, get away from snake. Call 911… poison control. In the event of a rattlesnake bite, you're gonna have swelling.

Amy: So, you're gonna wanna remove any tight-fitting clothing. If you're bit on the hand, you wanna take off your watches, your rings, your jewelry. You want to allow for that swelling. Uh, similarly if you're bit on the leg, you might wanna, you know, rip open the pants, take off the shoe, take off the boot, whatever, let that swelling occur.

Amy: You want to mark the location of the bite and the time of the bite on the victim. The person may get separated from a cell phone at some point during this transfer to hospital. So, it's really good to have that information right there on the bite wound. Uh, so we recommend people keep like a Sharpie in their pack if they're hiking or…

Amy: camping or whatever around snake country. Keep a Sharpie on you. Mark the bite extent of the swelling. Circle it… time. This can give the doctors good information about how that is progressing. It had been slightly controversial in the past of like whether you want to elevate or whether you want to have the limb below the heart, but the science is now saying to have the affected limb slightly elevated or neutral to the heart.

Amy: So, we don't want to have, if you're bit on the hand, let's say, we don't want to have the hand down at your side because the venom will then concentrate in the hand. And one of the things that venom does for the snake is that it starts the process of digestion. So, that means tissue damage and tissue death.

Kellie: Interesting. I did not know that. So, it's like a pre– 

Amy: It's like a predigestion. Yeah. So, these toxins that are, uh, hemotoxic, meaning they attack the blood, it's breaking things down. So, we don't want to concentrate venom in any area. So, on that note, we do not want a tourniquet as well, because again, that's going to concentrate the venom in the affected limb as well as just being dangerous because if you tourniquet really tightly, you start to get tissue damage within two hours.

Kellie: Oh, my goodness. And these are all things that you teach in that class? 

Amy: Yeah. 

Kellie: And then people get to actually handle a rattlesnake? 

Amy: Yeah. So, day one, we teach you all the scary facts about snake bite and show you some scary photos of what it looks like. So, on the second day of the training, um, our participants come in and they learn from our team of expert instructors how to handle the snakes with tools.

Kellie: With tools. What kind of tools do you use to handle snakes? I saw you earlier when you were showing me Tesoro. You had a long pole with a hook in it. What, what's going on? 

Amy: So, we've got snake hooks and snake tongs, and these are now commercially available, which is great 'cause my great uncle who was wrangling rattlesnakes in his house where he shouldn't have had them, he was using homemade tools.

Kellie: Oh, my goodness. 

Amy: So, we're really fortunate now they make tools that are, um, available for purchase. So, these are arm extenders essentially, right? Rule number one is keep your hand away from the bitey end. So, we use long handled hooks, snake hooks. And, uh, tongs, which look like, you know, grabbers essentially. And we use the snake hooks and snake tongs to maneuver the snake as well as to maneuver things like the bag that we're putting the snake in and the bucket lid.

Amy: So, we're always keeping our limbs, our hands, and our legs at a safe distance from the animal. So, we're using the snake hook to gently kind of scoop the snake up and then place them into a bag or a bucket, place them in a bag in the bucket, securing the bucket lid. 

Kellie: So, people who take that class, they actually get to do that process?

Amy: So, we practice first all these techniques with the non-venomous snakes. And then once everyone is comfortable and gets that muscle memory of how to do these techniques, then we move on, and we use our northern Pacific rattlesnakes. So, we actually have our participants use the hooks, use the tongs to secure a rattlesnake.

Amy: The… they are, uh, supervised the entire time by our instructors. And so, an instructor is right there, right beside them, to step in any point if they need assistance or if we see anything that's potentially dangerous. So, it's a very controlled environment, very safe. We also never force anyone to do anything they're not comfortable with.

Kellie: Have you found that when people take the class that their perceptions of rattlesnakes change after they've gone through the training? 

Amy: Absolutely. I mean, some of the people who take our course are snake lovers. So, they're snake nerds like me, and they just come in and they're ready to go. Right. These are, these are the people who are excited and, and so those people already love snakes.

Amy: But we get a lot of people who take our course who are taking it for work. You know, they're being sent by their, by their employer to learn these skills. And they may not really love snakes as much as I do. They may have a fear of snakes. This may be the first time they've been in a room with a rattlesnake.

Amy: So, it's a really powerful experience. Um, but we make sure that it's a very calm environment. And the instructors that we have are all very professional and very compassionate. And so, if anyone doesn't feel comfortable working with the snakes, they don't have to do that. But what I have seen a lot of times is that people will see us do it 'cause we demonstrate it first.

Amy: They'll watch us do it, they'll see other people do it. They'll kind of get their toes wet, you know, with the non-venomous snakes. And once they get comfortable with the non-venomous snakes, then we bring out the rattlesnake. I have seen, um, people feel so much more empowered after going through this course and something that in their minds was this terrifying experience of just being around a rattlesnake becomes something that's, “Oh, I can handle this.”

Amy: That's the goal of the courses is to take someone from a situation where they're panicking because they see a rattlesnake to… they see a rattlesnake and they go, “I've got this.” 

Kellie: “I know what to do because I've gone through their training.” 

Amy: Exactly. 

Kellie: Now, this was the first time I've been in a room — that I know of with a rattlesnake. Maybe there was one hanging out and they just didn't wanna make their presence known. But I felt comfortable because you were so knowledgeable and you were making sure that I was okay– 

Amy: Thank you.

Kellie: Yeah, I was like, “Ok, I trust this person.” That was really cool.

Amy: I think one of the biggest things about working around rattlesnakes is just staying calm.

Kellie: Oh, for sure. And especially, you talked about that even if you're bit staying calm is of the essence and importance as much as you can. 

Amy: I mean, I can't imagine how easy that would be, personally. I've never been bit, and I never want to, um, experience that. So, I think it might be easier said than done, but yeah, I have been bit by non-venomous snakes, but I was a zookeeper, so I was basically asking for it.

Kellie: Ok.

Amy: These are usually snakes that are, um, in my experience, the non-venomous snakes I've been bitten by were either very young, so they're very inexperienced and very fearful around people, or they were wild snakes, you know, and again, very limited experience with people. And to a snake, we look like a giant predator.

Kellie: Oh, for sure. They're just protecting themselves. 

Amy: Mm-hmm. 

Kellie: And so, if you were to give any advice to someone you talked about if you're bit by a snake, what to do, call 911…poison control. But if somebody encounters a rattlesnake in their environment, whether it's their backyard, their garage, or whatever. What should they do? Who should they call? 

Amy: If you see a rattlesnake where wherever you are, I'd say stay calm and keep distance. So, we tell people about the 30-30 Rule. So, let's say you're, you're walking on a trail, and you encounter a rattlesnake on the trail, they're probably sunning themselves because they're cold-blooded so, they need, they need the sun, and that's how they end up on trails and on roads. If you've seen the rattlesnake, you're, that's great because you can take 30 steps back, give it 30 seconds. A lot of times the snake will just move along its way. That's the best-case scenario. And then, you know, once the snake has moved on its way, it doesn't wanna have anything to do with you and you can proceed as you were.

Amy: This is gonna be a little bit different if it's in your home, right? If you encounter a rattlesnake and it's gotten into somewhere where maybe it shouldn't be, it's gonna be a little bit different. So again, I would say stay calm. We like to empower people to be able to manage that themselves, but not everybody has that knowledge, has gone through our course.

Amy: Um, or is comfortable doing so. So, you can call emergency responders, you can call animal control. Uh, you can call. There are people who offer services of snake removal. There's multiple different people you can call with the understanding there will be different outcomes depending on who shows up. If you call 911, you may get the fire department or police.

Amy: They may just kill that snake. If you call animal control, they may kill the snake. They may remove it, relocate it somewhere else. It depends on each different department. If you call the professional snake remover, they might charge you like 150 bucks or so and they might move that snake. And they might move that snake very far away and that can also be bad for the snake.

Kellie: Okay.

Amy: So, what we've learned about rattlesnakes is that they have very really small home ranges, and when they're taken further than like a mile, it's not very far. A mile or two miles out is a long distance for them for their home range. And so, they can suffer a lot of mortality events from being taken that far away from their home range.

Amy: They have really limited home ranges, and when they're taken away from their home ranges, they spend all of their energy and time just making a beeline trying to get back into their familiar territory. So, that could make them cross a road. It could have road mortality. It could make them cross, you know, big open field where then they're in danger of predation from hawks, um, or exposed to the elements.

Amy: So, snake relocation is something that is a lot more complex. It's a nice idea to be like, oh, I've got this snake in my yard. I don't want it here. Oh, they'll just call and remove it and the snake's gonna be happy and live its life. But it's more complex than that because it matters where they're moved to.

Kellie: I did not know that. So, talking about that, are they social creatures? Do they have family units? Like how are they living their lives? 

Amy: Yeah, so, so. We're talking about rattles sinks specifically. They can be social. Uh, they typically will be social during the time of year where they're in brumation. So, they're… it's wintertime, they're gonna go into like a communal burrow or den, and there might be lots of rattlesnakes there over the winter.

Amy: Um, in other times of the year, there's gonna be social behaviors because males are looking for females, they're looking for a mate. So, in the springtime we have rattlesnakes that males are moving around trying to find a female to mate with. In the fall, we have the rattlesnake babies being born, and so they're dispersing and they're trying to find a place to live.

Amy: Um, and then in the wintertime we've got rattlesnakes that are overwintering together in communal boroughs, so they have a little bit more complexity in their social structures than what a lot of people have believed. They do provide some care for the young rattlesnakes. So, when people think about snakes, usually they don't think about like paternal behaviors, right?

Amy: They're not like birds that are feeding their babies. They're not mammals that are taking care of their babies. But they have recently found that rattlesnakes actually do care for the young and they give life birth. So, when the young are born in these communal dens or burrows, that there are adult rattlesnakes that are sort of babysitting the babies and they may be unrelated to the babies.

Amy: So, it's like this little kind of community 

Kellie: Yeah. That does say something about a social structure when you're taking care of a… a creature that's not your offspring. When they are rattling, is it just a danger warning or is it also a communication tool to other rattlesnakes or.., 

Amy: Rattling is a, is… is a response to a threat.

Kellie: Okay. 

Amy: And interestingly, the shaking of a tail in response to a threat… is not unique to rattlesnakes. There are a lot of snakes that will, uh, rattle their tail in response to a perceived threat. So, for example, gopher snakes will often shake their tails, and it will produce this kind of vibrating sound when they're shaking their tails and it's hitting against like rocks or leaves or things like that.

Amy: So, rattling and tail shaking occurs as a response to a threat in many different species of snakes. But the rattlesnakes just took it one step further by developing the rattle to really amplify that sound and make it well known. “Hey, I'm here. Please, please don't step on me.”

Kellie: When I heard Tesoro, that was the first time I'd ever heard a rattlesnake in person or met one.

Amy: Mm-hmm. 

Kellie: And it's a very distinctive sound. 

Amy: It is. And it kind of, you feel something when you hear that sound, don't you? 

Kellie: Oh, absolutely. Like, okay, my hair is on my end…standing on its ends, and I am at warning now, too. 

Amy: Mm-hmm. 

Kellie: I will respect your telling me to back off because I don't wanna hurt you, you don't wanna hurt me.

Amy: Right. So, that's, that's what it's there for. It is, it is there for defense and, and other stakes will also utilize that same rattling behavior. Which I find fascinating. 

Kellie: That is so cool. So, all kinds of fascinating things that you've known, you've learned. How did you get here? Like how did you end up being a snake expert, know… understanding all these things about rattlesnakes and all kinds of snakes? What is your journey? 

Amy: So, I grew up always loving animals. Uh, watched a lot of documentaries as a kid, loved animals. But I remember the first time I ever met a snake in person. And it's kind of an unconventional way from what most of my colleagues will describe. Um, so I was a theater kid. 

Kellie: Yay. Me too. 

Amy: And I… I loved doing all kinds of theater performing. And when I was 11 years old, I was in a production of the Jungle Book. 

Kellie: Oh, how fun. 

Amy: Yeah. And I was cast as Ka the Snake. 

Kellie: Stop it right now! 

Amy: Which I was really excited about. Somebody brought their pet ball python to the rehearsal so that I could meet this snake and like study the way it moves. And I remember being 11 years old and them placing this little, tiny snake in my hand and I just remember being completely fascinated by the way it wove itself through my fingers.

Amy: And I was just hooked from then on. It was like, these are the coolest animals. Like, they're so amazing, so beautiful. So, then I pursued, you know, a degree in biology, and I volunteered for various different organizations. So I volunteered for a bird rescue, which is really interesting. I volunteered at the San Francisco Zoo, and I volunteered at Lindsay Wildlife in Walnut Creek.

Amy: And I just… I kept exposing myself to like these different areas of animal care. Um, working with animals in whatever way I could. I fi– I finally landed a job as a zookeeper, and it wasn't with snakes originally. I worked with all different kinds of animals, but my favorite ones to work with was always the snakes.

Amy: So, I slowly kind of just started like specializing more and more in snakes, and I found Save the Snakes in 2018 when Michael Starkey gave a talk at my local library, and I went because I was like, oh, someone's giving a talk about snakes. Awesome. I'm gonna go and I'm gonna watch this talk about snakes.

Amy: And I knew from that minute I was like, this organization is doing exactly what I wanna do. So being a voice for snakes, but also with the goal of keeping people safe as well. So, I think that's the really beautiful thing about this organization is that we wanna keep snakes safe. Yes. But we also wanna help people to stay safe as well. And the coexistence… it is possible even if it's difficult. 

Kellie: I love that. And as somebody is with a theater background, I love that it all started with theater. 

Amy: It did. 

Kellie: See the importance of storytelling and theater and science and learning. I think that's so cool. So, when you tell people what you do that have never met you before, you're like, “Hey, you know, my name's Amy...” And they're like, “What do you do?” “You know, I work with snakes.” What are people's first reaction usually? 

Amy: Oh, it varies. It depends on the person. It, um, you know, I get everything from, “That's so cool,” to, “Eww. Disgusting.” So, you know, I've developed a thick skin about that. 

Kellie: I love that. So, this, um, this podcast kind of uses collective nouns as the inspiration to talk about different animal groupings and stuff. So, this is A Rhumba of Rattlesnakes. Um, do you think that rhumba, which is a dance, do you think that's a good personification of like a group of snakes or rattlesnakes and their sound or anything? Do you think that's an appropriate one? 

Amy: I think that's great for rattlesnakes. I like the, I like the, um, nod towards music. Uh, rattlesnakes do produce a very musical sound with their tails, with the buzzing. Um, I also enjoy when we characterize snakes in a way that isn't automatically scary. Right? 

Kellie: Yeah. 

Amy: So, it's not like, it is not like you hear sometimes about like nests of rattlesnakes and it's usually conjures up this kind of scary image. So, a rhumba of rattlesnakes is more fun and kind of humanizes them a little bit. So, I really do think that a rhumba of rattlesnakes, which I've never heard before, is a fun way. 

Kellie: If you were in charge of words, which I hope to be someday, would you choose a different group name? 

Amy: I… I don't think I can come up with anything better than rhumba of rattlesnakes. I think that the music… musicality of it is good. And one interesting thing about the rattle and the rattlesnakes, and since we're talking about the sound that they produce, is when people think of a rattlesnake and the rattle that it produces, they think of maracas a lot of time, right? 

Kellie: Yeah. 

Amy: Because a maraca can create that kind of sound. However, a lot of people don't know that the way that the rattle is produced is from interlocking segments of the rattle. So, the rattle itself is just keratinized tissue. So, it's like fingernails. 

Kellie: Okay. 

Amy: And every time they shed another segment is added to the rattle. And if you were to take a cross section of the rattle, you would see these like, almost like nesting dolls in there. So, it's not like little balls inside the rattle or anything like that. It's just interlocking segments of the rattle, and as they're shaking it, they're hitting against each other and creating that sound. 

Kellie: That's so fascinating, and like she's waving her hand right now and kind of she's describing it and it's so cool to think about. What is… what is your… one of your favorite things maybe that we haven't talked about, that you've discovered about rattlesnakes that you think is just really cool and fascinating? 

Amy: One of the things that scientists recently discovered that I kind of discovered anecdotally was that rattlesnakes can hear. So, I don't know if you notice when we were looking at the snakes, they don't have an external ear hole. No snake does. 

Kellie: Yeah. 

Amy: So, people thought they were deaf for a really long time. They thought they could only hear vibrations through like the jaws and like touching the ground and sensing vibrations. Scientists recently discovered that snakes can hear, when they can hear airborne sound. And I learned this when I was at the zoo, um, because I carried this like radio for communication with other zookeepers, right? 

Kellie: Yeah. 

Amy: And I would be in the room, but across the room from the rattlesnake enclosure, the rattlesnake couldn't see me. The room is totally quiet, the rattlesnake is quiet. All of a sudden, the radio goes off, and there's a person on the radio very loudly talking. And from across the room, I hear the rattlesnake rattle in response to the radio. So, I could tell that they could hear. Um, and I thought that was really interesting thing.

Kellie: There's such musical creatures. I think it would be a sad thing if they couldn't hear. 

Amy: Right? Yeah. I don't know how much they like music, but– 

Kellie: Well, they make it themselves. They don't need any other music. 

Amy: That's true. 

Kellie: Do you think that media has been unfair in characterizing rattlesnakes? 

Amy: Absolutely. I think that one thing that I would hear a lot of when I worked at the zoo, um, even now when we're doing outreach, sometimes… is that people have this perception of snakes that they're just aggressive, right? When you're seeing a snake in a movie, you're not usually seeing them just hanging out. You're seeing them with their fangs out, biting, striking, hissing, rattling, all of the above. This is not how snakes usually behave when they encounter a person. 

Amy: They do not chase people. They do not want anything to do with us. We are not their prey, so they don't get anything from biting us for no reason. Unfortunately, snake bites do happen, and scientists have found that that's actually usually accidental. People step somewhere or put their hands somewhere where they don't see a snake because they're very cryptic animals and snake gets frightened and bites them.

Amy: But people have this perception of snakes as villains and monsters thanks to movies and the way that they're portrayed. With keeping the balance in mind of understanding that this is an animal that is, does have the potential to be dangerous and should be respected… we don't need to also be so afraid of them that we're running and screaming just at the sight of one.

Amy: Um, I often would hear, “The only good snake is a dead snake.” That phrase was said to me hundreds of times at the zoo because people really believe that these animals are more like monsters than they are animals. 

Kellie: And education is so important to changing that. 

Amy: Yes. 

Kellie: Keeping the snakes and us safe. 

Amy: Yeah, absolutely.

Kellie: This is one of those, you know, artsy questions. If a snake could tell us something that (a rattlesnake) was important for us to know, what do you think a rattlesnake would tell us? 

Amy: Please don't hurt me. 

Kellie: I think that's fair.

Amy: I… I think the snake would say, “I'm scared of you.” Because people, people really, I think, underestimate how frightened snakes are of us. We are a big scary animal to them. Rattlesnakes would tell people, I'm afraid, please don't hurt me. 

Kellie: What's your favorite part of your job? 

Amy: Oh boy. My favorite part is the outreach, actually, when I get to do any kind of outreach where I'm connecting people with snakes. That's my favorite part. 

Kellie: Amy, thank you so much for taking your time, and you've been so gracious and generous with all of your information and knowledge.

Amy: Thank you for having me. 

Kellie: Yay. Go rattlesnakes. 

(sound of a horn)

Johnathan: When I shed my skin, I was hoping for enlightenment. What I got was sweat, sarcasm, and a reminder to stop dating men who don't recycle. 

Kellie: So why a rhumba of rattlesnakes and not a waltz? Some say it's from the visual rhythm of rattlesnakes, twisting and gliding across one another. A mesmerizing dance of scales and tails.

Kellie: But who said it first? I like to imagine it was a lovelorn and love-worn poet drowning their unrequited, unwritten words in one too many rattlesnake cocktails. Yes, that's a thing. And I need to try one. Whiskey, lemon juice, simple syrup, absinthe, and egg whites. My, my, my. Well, said sobbing poet probably drank one too many rattlesnakes and imagined pencils gliding in a love dance on paper.

Kellie: I'm going with that origin story. And here's a tidbit. Rattlesnakes actually prefer solitude. But when gathered, especially in colder months or during mating season, their group movements do create a fascinating, poetic, and rhythmic dance worthy of the name rhumba. 

Damon: When I shed my skin, I didn't mean to leave you behind, but you weren't coming with the version of me I had to forge. We know. The space, the time, and maybe just maybe...you wanted me to go. And I did.

Kellie: I love how stories and people come together. So, what is the story behind the rumba? The dance. To find the true heartbeat of the dance, we have to go back to mid-19th century Cuba. It was born as a powerful fusion of West African drumming and Spanish song. For the marginalized Afro-Cuban communities who created it, the rumba was a lifeline, a gathering of joy, defiance, and pure resilience. This authentic Cuban rumba was so potent. The government tried to silence its drums in 1925 as part of a broader repression of Afro-Cuban culture. It survived. And by 2016, UNESCO rightly enshrined Cuban rumba as a treasure of humanity.

Kellie: I love that. And by the way, that UNESCO list? Our old friend falconry from episode one is on there, too. Both are human practices that bind us to tradition and community. It just shows how vital it is to honor the true source of these incredible traditions. The rumba is a story of resilience, a culture holding onto its soul and joy, even when the world tries to silence it. That kind of resilience isn't just for history books. It's gritty, personal, the strength you summon when you shed your skin only to find some of the old pain still clings. What do you do with that discovery? Well, that's its own kind of dance. 

Marilyn: When I shed my skin, the pain is still there, but I've got my dog, baseball, dragons, and frankly, pain can kiss my freckled ass. 

Kellie: Well, listeners, she's back. You may remember her from our first episode, her quill sharp, her language legendary.

Kellie: Joining us once again via our highly unregulated make-believe time portal is Dame Juliana Berners, a 15th-century writer, renowned nun, say that fast five times. And she is an original gatherer of collective nouns. Dame Juliana, welcome back to A Gather of Gatherings. 

(sound of a digital time warp glitch)

Dame Juliana Berners: Tis a pleasure most peculiar, Mistress Kellie. I find myself most delighted to return, though I admit the travel between centuries leaves one slightly winded. Time it seems, has a draft. 

Kellie: Thank you for braving the temporal turbulence to be here. In this episode, we are exploring a rhumba of rattlesnakes. Now, Dame Juliana, I know rattlesnakes weren't part of your world in 1486. Is that correct? 

Dame Juliana Berners: Mercifully, or maybe regrettably, no. The only serpents we knew wore velvet and ambition and did their whispering behind cloaks and bibles. Shh. Don't tell anyone I said that. I'm still unclear on the jurisdiction for time-traveling podcast confessions. Back to the rattle at hand. I've made myself acquainted with these curvy ground ripples. This rattling, reptile coiled like a question mark with fangs is both poet and warning bell. I admire it. 

Kellie: Speaking of admiration, Dame Juliana, in this episode, I chat with a rattlesnake expert, a real-life rattlesnake handler and educator. She respects them, studies them, and educates people, like me, so rattlesnakes and humans can coexist safely. I mean, Dame Juliana, I watched her from six feet away handle a rattlesnake named Tesoro. It was one of the most amazing experiences I've had involving the natural world. It was magical. 

Dame Juliana Berners: In my day, a woman who touched a snake might be burned or canonized or both. I like her spirit, her calling. She sounds like a woman who doesn't ask permission to approach the wild. She just does. And the wild, sensing her integrity, welcomes her. 

Kellie: You know, I never thought of that. There is integrity in nature and I will say an integrity that nature asks of us. What would you say, Dame Juliana, to women who walk the line between reverence and risk? 

Dame Juliana Berners: I would say walk like you belong to the forest and the fire. Know the difference between a warning and a welcome and remember, serpents don't whisper to those who rush. 

Kellie: I love that. That's actually kind of tattoo worthy if you think about it. You know, when we rush through life and meaning and moments, you know, we don't always allow ourselves knowledge and maybe even transformation when we're rushing, right?

Dame Juliana Berners: In my day, it twas men who controlled the narrative for the most. Wielding quills like sabers and ink as blood, deciding what was written and on whom. A mark on the skin. Oh, that was for witches, pilgrims, sailors, the damned. But to choose one's own story on one's own body in fact. There's power in choosing your own script etched into the one thing they never let us claim in my time. Our body. 

Kellie: Dame Juliana, leave it to you to drop a truth bomb wrapped in digital parchment on a podcast in a fictional but very resonant interview through time and space portals. 

Dame Juliana Berners: Our bodies, our ink, our stories claimed word by word. And you wonder why I collected nouns. Hmm. Imagine what I might do with verbs.

Kellie: Now, that's an entirely different podcast. And you know, you have me thinking maybe that's why the snake holds such power. It doesn't ask permission to shed what no longer fits. You know, it slips out of the old, leaves it behind like a hushed defiance and moves on, but ready to warn those who may hurt it… with nature's percussion no less. And that reminds me, and it circles me back to almost inevitably, if not rhumba, what would you call a gather of rattlesnakes? 

Dame Juliana Berners: Hmm. A shiver, a summons or perhaps a reckoning? 

Kellie: Well said, Dame Juliana. Thank you for joining us again. As always, it is a pleasure. And may your ink run wild, your falcons stay faithful, and your metaphors never molt.

Dame Juliana Berners: And may your own rhumba be full of rhythm and the occasional bite should you welcome that. Oh, I blush. And may your nouns run forever wild.

Kellie: When I shed my skin, I realized it was just my bra and expectations, so I kicked them both off and ordered tacos. Like you do. 

Kellie: Shawn, my bestie, my partner in crime, my ride or die, what is your rattlesnake story? 

Shawn: You know, when you were little and things like were scary? I really thought quicksand was gonna be a… an issue along those lines.

Shawn: I really thought rattlesnakes were gonna be an issue, that it was gonna be something you have to deal with as an adult. 

Kellie: Well, they are, 

Shawn: No, they're not. I've not… I've dealt with as many rattlesnakes as I've had quicksand. 

Kellie: But wait until there's rattlesnakes in quicksand. 

Shawn: Of which I'm nowhere near either. So, I'm pretty happy about that. I've lived this long, and I've not yet really seen either of them in true action, so I'm like, I think I'm okay. So, that being said, that is swirling around my head. I was at a… an appointment up in El Dorado Hills or Folsom or somewhere, and I parked in the parking lot and there were signs, individual signs, like I couldn't tell what it said at first. 

Shawn: I thought, is it a no-parking or is what? Clean up... clean up after your dog? Well, I get up closer to it and I'm reading it. And the sign said rattlesnakes are everywhere around this parking lot. What kind of sign is that? And it's green and it's like all earth friendly, cute little sign. There are rattlesnakes. And I'm looking and I'm like, because it's up in Folsom, it's in a very, there's bushes and things everywhere these signs are, it's all this like hidden bushes right next to the parking lot. And I'm standing there reading it, going well then wouldn't that be something if I ran into a rattlesnake up here after being scared of rattlesnakes for no apparent reason, no sooner did I say that when, granted it wasn't a rattlesnake, but it was a lizard that came out of the bush and ran across my foot, right when I'm thinking, wouldn't it be horrible if a rattlesnake came out, and that happened… And let's just say I was glad I was at the hospital 'cause I had a nervous breakdown. That was not funny. What are the chances you wanna talk about rattlesnakes and now I see a sign, there's rattlesnake crossing here.

Shawn: What? What do you mean rattlesnakes are here? Oh. So, they are everywhere. I'll let you know if I ever see a sign about quicksand, I'm leaving Sacramento. 

Kellie: Well, the quicksand may make you leave because it'll suck you up. 

Shawn: Like if I didn't have that sign there, I may have walked in the bushes and got bit by a rattlesnake. No, that's probably not true. But at least I was conscious that there was rattlesnakes around there. 

Kellie: You just would've randomly walked into the bushes? 

Shawn: No. 

Kellie: But the odds are not zero. 

Shawn: Like I said, I think we're more likely to fall in quicksand.

Kellie: I mean, or at least a sinkhole. Right? Have you ever seen a rattlesnake in person?

Shawn: No, not that I'm aware of. 

Kellie: I saw one when I interviewed Amy at Save the Snakes in Rancho Cordova. Not far from here. 

Shawn: What? 

Kellie: Yeah. And I heard the rattle. I saw it. I was six feet away. 

Shawn: Doesn't it make that rattling sound when it's scared and it doesn't want you to come near it? It wants you to know it's there 'cause it's about to milk you some venom. 

Kellie: Milk you some venom. 

Shawn: Were you scared? 

Kellie: It was a healthy, scared to… to listen to every instruction that she gave me. Stay six feet away. And I said, I'm good with that. 

Shawn: Was it out in the open? Oh, shut the front door. No. Stay six feet away of the plastic plexiglass that's supposed to be between the two of you. Oh, no way. I think they can jump. 

Kellie: So, when I got there, she had already taken Tesoro out of its enclosure. It was in a plastic bucket with a lid. 

Shawn: And you did Britney Spears like with the yellow python and wrapped it around your shoulders and danced around in circles like you were living your best life with the little thing going… (makes rattlesnake noise).

Kellie: I did not do that. But to hear the sound in person. It's… I got goosebumps remembering it. It's very ominous. It was nuts to see a rattlesnake in person and she handled it, but I mean, she is a pro, she's an expert. 

Shawn: But she didn't pick it up or touch it with her hands. 

Kellie: She used to pole. One number one safety rule I remember for the conversation is you do not handle a snake with your hands. You keep your body away from striking distance. 

Shawn: Who speaks rattlesnakes? I'm sorry. 

Kellie: Harry Potter. He speaks Parseltongue. 

Shawn: There, there's a TikTok trend where they have a snake on a little chain that they kind of tack to the back of the, the one of their partners playing golf, and they're on the golf field every time they're like, oh, the guys like, “Watch Bill over there.” Well, then Bill doesn't know that there's a fake snake rattlesnake attached to a string on his back, and he turns around, and he starts running, and then he starts running and running and hitting with the golf club and different degrees of person depending on how they react to this scenario, it's very amusing. 

Kellie: Shawn, complete this phrase. Start with, "When I shed my skin..." and then complete it. So just say, "When I shed my skin..." And then just whatever comes to your mind. 

Shawn: When I shed my skin, I hope I come out better than I left it behind. It makes me think of a journey being taken and after every journey, who doesn't want to be better than the way they left it?

Kellie: And just like Shawn had an experience with rattlesnakes and a signpost, we can't close without the legend of Rattlesnake Kate. Picture this October 1925, dusty Colorado ranch. Kate Slaughterback, great name, and her son Ernie ride out for dinner ducks only to stumble into a rattlesnake migration. Over 140 buzzing vipers carpeted around them. She calmly dismounts, levels her .22 Remington and opens fire. When the rifle finally clicks empty, Kate does something truly legendary. She spots a nearby "No Hunting" sign, rips it right out of the ground, and goes to work, turning a piece of government property into a medieval weapon. An hour later, one woman, one rifle, one very ironic sign, and 140 rattlesnakes silenced, but she didn't stop there.

Kellie: From the hides of her vanquished foes, Kate stitched a full dress, belt, and shoes. Frontier couture so notorious, the Smithsonian reportedly offered her two grand — lot of money back then. Not a one-shot wonder, she then spent decades milking snakes for venom, fueling medical research, and in true Kate fashion cemented her legend. When she passed in 1969, her headstone bore just two words, Rattlesnake Kate. Her story teaches us grit, and it's a reminder that sometimes the signs we need are always right in front of us. 

Rose: When I shed my skin, I Swiftly ditched sorry for being sparkly stadium loud and sliding into my reputation era. 

Kellie: And that's our dance for now. Rattlesnakes, the story of a collective noun, the defiant heartbeat of the Cuban rumba, and the inner and outer signs that guide our own reckonings. It seems this episode, much like our serpentine friends had to take its time shedding a few skins to get ready for you. Full transparency. Turns out transformation has its own timeline, and I am so glad this one is finally here to meet the world.

Kellie: And that's really the thread that ties it all together, isn't it? Shedding what no longer fits, whether it's a physical skin, ouch, oppression in whatever form it marches in, or the fears that limit us. We use language, music, a reckoning, a summons, as Dame Juliana suggested, to try and name the wild universe around us and the even wilder galaxies within us.

Kellie: This episode was a true gathering of its own, and I couldn't have done it without the incredible people who lent their voices and expertise. A very special thank you to Amy Brumbaugh and everyone at Save the Snakes, especially Tesoro, for opening their doors and buckets. I also couldn't have done it without the amazing chorus of voices for "When I Shed My Skin."

Kellie: Thank you to Margaret, Elaine, Tory, Drew, Gay, Johnny, Damon, my mom, and Rose. Thanks to Kelley for her Dame Juliana performance and love to my ride-or-die bestie Shawn for his humor as always. Guess what? The story doesn't end here. In fact, when this episode finishes, there's more waiting for you. I'm introducing "Gatherlings." Shorter companion pieces to our main gatherings.

Kellie: The first one is queued up as the very next episode in your feed. Consider it a Save the Snakes sampler featuring my full uncut tour where you can meet even more of their amazing ambassador animals. Like Orlando an eastern indigo snake, so gorgeous. And keep an eye on the feed because I'll soon be releasing "GatherStrands: A Parable of Love and Sheddings.”

Kellie: It's a working title. A special fictional story that weaves all of the episode's "When I Shed My Skin" vignettes into one creative narrative. Check out my blog and the show notes for links to Save the Snakes, to learn more about their vital conservation work and more cool info from the show. Finally, if these stories moved you, the best way to help our gathering grow is to subscribe, share it with a friend, and leave a rating or review wherever you listen and linger.

Kellie: It truly helps these tales find their way in the wild. Until next time, Gatherers, what's your favorite collective noun? Go on. I am listening.