snakes

[Mook Jong]

I was wondering, what kind of snakes are there in china? I know, this might sound kinda dumb but i was wondering what kind there were because i always here about some master spent years in the woods studying the movements of a certain animal and i was curious what species of snakes they were.

[Ben Gash]

They have dozens of varieties. Most common is probably the rat snake,or maybe the bamboo snake, but also fairly common are cobras, kraits,keelbacks and pythons.

[Dragonzbane76]

SNAKES! did you say Snakes?

[MasterKiller]

My style is based around the movements of the notorious 'trouser' snake.

[No_SuRReNDeR]

Snakes on a Forum! Quick call Sam Jackson....

No seriously though... heres a good website with info on Asian snake species.

http://www.ecologyasia.com/verts/snakes.htm

[Samurai Jack]

SNAKES! did you say Snakes?

"... a symbol? A crest? Perhaps on a shield or a standard? Two snakes coming together... but they are one!"

[Dragonzbane76]

Black sun, black moon..... yes yes....



AHHHHHHHHHHHHH.... Tamorra, Tamorra, what you seek is in TAMORRA.......

[Samurai Jack]

There is a price, barbarian.

[GeneChing]

Chinese man gets five days’ detention for releasing snake in park
It is latest case of people freeing wild animals on the mainland in so-called ‘mercy releases’
PUBLISHED : Tuesday, 12 September, 2017, 12:48pm
UPDATED : Tuesday, 12 September, 2017, 5:00pm



He Huifeng
huifeng.he@scmp.com

A video of the man releasing the serpent in Xiangtan, Hunan province, on Saturday has been widely shared online.
Several internet users contacted the police after watching the footage, warning that the cobra was dangerous, the news website Rednet.cn reported.
Firefighters tried to find the snake on Sunday, but failed, according to the article.
The park’s operators later had to issue a warning about the cobra to tourists.
Freeing captive animals is a tradition in Buddhism and is said to create good karma.
Animal rights and environmental groups, however, have raised concerns about the practice on the mainland. They say it can lead to the death of animals, potentially spread disease and fuel illegal trading in wild creatures.
A large number of snakes, turtles and other captive animals were freed in “mercy releases” on a beach in Haikou in Hainan province in January to mark the new year. Tourists at the beach called the police for help after they found animals, including pythons, slithering in the sand.
Several women tried to release about 500 Brazilian turtles into a lake on the campus of Peking University last October, but were stopped by students.

snakes and Buddhist 'life release'

[GeneChing]

I had a similar experience once. I was just coming back from China so very jet lagged and there was this snake on the floor. The cat probably brought it in. But I thought it was a new toy snake that my kid had so I reached down to pick it up. My old house had pergo floors and snakes can't really crawl on pergo - too slippery - so it wriggled. I screamed like a girl.

‘Realistic toy snake’ gives Chinese family the fright of their lives
Child unpacks box from online toy shop to find something not to be trifled with
PUBLISHED : Sunday, 08 October, 2017, 3:42pm
UPDATED : Sunday, 08 October, 2017, 6:31pm



Viola Zhou
viola.zhou@scmp.com
https://twitter.com/violazhouyi


The woman first thought the 20cm snake was plastic when her six-year-old son took it out of the packaging in Haining, Zhejiang province, Haining Daily reported late last week.
Marvelling at its soft patterned skin, the woman showed the snake to her husband, remarking on how realistic toys were becoming, the report said
But the husband looked at the snake’s head and soon worked out that it was real – albeit dead.
Forestry authorities said the animal was a non-venomous Mandarin rat snake and might have slithered into the parcel for warmth.
“I’m glad it was dead,” the woman was quoted as saying. “I dare not imagine what would happen if it weren’t.”
The online toy shop said it had no idea how the snake got into the parcel, but agreed to offer the family a refund, the report said.

[GeneChing]

Call me callous, but I don't have a lot of sympathy for bitten snake handlers. Same goes for gored matadors.

1 day ago
Star teen snake wrangler fighting for life after bite from 'world's deadliest snake'
Fox News


The inland taipan is usually quite shy and is known to only strike when it is provoked or mishandled. (Credit: Nathan Chetcuti, Facebook)

A famous 19-year-old snake wrangler from Australia is fighting for his life after being bitten by his pet snake, one that is regarded as the world's most venomous.

Nathan Chetcuti, from Brisbane, Australia, was attempting to put his pet inland taipan back into its enclosure on Sunday when the snake lashed out and bit him. Nathan's father immediately called emergency services after seeing the horiffic attack.

Toxicologist Dr. Geoff Isbister told the Australian Broadcasting Company that the snake's poison can cause major issues for humans. “In terms of its effects, it causes blood not to clot, but its most important effect is it causes neurotoxicity," Isbister said. "So if it’s not treated early, it can cause paralysis.”

As of Nov. 7, Chetcuti was still in serious condition in the intensive care unit of Redcliffe Hospital in Queensland, where his family has remained by his side.

On Chetcuti's YouTube page, Australian Pythons And Other Reptiles, which has more than 4,000 subscribers, he has several videos of non-venmous snakes and other reptiles, according to a report in news.com.au, which first reported the story.

The inland taipan snake, however, is known as a fierce snake from central east Australia and is regarded as the most venomous snake on the planet. A bite from the inland taipan could kill a person in 45 minutes if left untreated, according to a 2013 report from the University of Melbourne.

Unlike the saw-scaled viper or the king cobra snake, the inland taipan is usually quite shy. It is known to only strike when it is provoked or mishandled, so the strike on Chetcuti comes as a surprise to some.

In 2013, a 17-year-old male was bitten by an inland taipan in New South Wales, but he eventually recovered from the attack.

Following the bite, Hunter Valley snake catcher Judy Martin kept the snake and said they're usually very docile. “They are a very placid snake, they rarely bite,” she said, according to news.com.au.

[GeneChing]

There's a vid behind the link. The dude is pretty nonchalant about it.

MAN HAILED AS HERO FOR KILLING SNAKE ON A TRAIN WITH BARE HANDS
BY SOFIA LOTTO PERSIO ON 11/23/17 AT 5:52 AM

A commuter on an Indonesian train was hailed as a hero on social media for his cold-blooded reaction to a finding a snake on the carriage.

A video of the man's encounter with the reptile quickly spread online Tuesday, getting more than 170,000 views and nearly 4,000 enthusiasic comments.

The video showed the man, wearing glasses and a backpack, on the train from Bogor to the capital, Jakarta, lifting himself to grab the snake with his bare hands from an overhead compartment.

Carefully holding it by its tail, the man, whose identity is unknown, then swung the snake to the floor with one swift blow, appearing to kill the reptile before kicking it outside the door onto the platform, where a security guard and a military officer were in attendance as the train made an emergency stop.

The reptile appeared to be around three feet in length, but it remains unclear what kind of snake it was and whether it was poisonous.

The Commuter Line train operator Kerata Commuter Indonesia (KCI) believes the snake was intentionally brought on the train, sneaking out of a passenger’s bag, but it is unlikely that the culprit will ever be found. "It will certainly be difficult because no one wants to confess," company spokesperson Eva Chairunnisa said in a statement to local media.

KCI also apologized to the passengers. "We regret the incident and apologise to train travelers who were disturbed by it," Chairunnisa told the AFP news agency.


Workers hold a snake before killing it at a slaughterhouse at Kapetakan village near Cirebon, Indonesia's West Java province, February 8, 2013. A man appeared to kill a snake found on a commuter train in Jakarta on November 21.
BEAWIHARTA/REUTERS

The train operator is a subsidiary of the state-owned railway company Kerata Api Indonesia. The Transport Ministry opened an investigation into the incident.

"The discovery of a snake inside a railcar on the Bogor-Angke line caused passengers to panic, so the train had to stop at Manggarai Station [in Central Jakarta]... to prevent a potential accident resulting from the panic," the directorate general said in a statement to local media on Wednesday.

Creating disturbances or danger to passengers on trains is an offense that can be punished with up to three weeks imprisonment.

[GeneChing]

After a decade of dormancy, we're overdue to ttt this OT: AI and Artificial Life forms thread. I'll copy it to snakes too, just because I can't quite wrap my coils around it.

Snake joke slithers into New York Times story
3 hours ago


GETTY IMAGES

The New York Times has corrected an article that mistakenly referred to the "Great Recession" as "the time of shedding and cold rocks".

One of its editors had installed software that adds references to snakes to websites.

The substitution was missed and published online, but did not appear in the print edition of the newspaper.

The newspaper blamed an "editing error involving a satirical text-swapping web browser extension".

The Millennials to Snake People add-on for Google's Chrome browser was created by coder Eric Bailey, who had noticed a surge in news stories blaming so-called millennials for the world's problems.

He decided changing the term "millennials" to "snake people" in news articles and on websites, and making other snake references, would be funny.

View image on Twitter

Justin Bank
✔
@bankonjustin
I'm horrified to be the guilty editor here. But thankfully @YLindaQiu's excellent work stands so far above it.

Also, I have now deleted the excellent Millenial-Snake Person Chrome extension. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/06/u...radefacts.html …
9:14 AM - Mar 7, 2018
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End of Twitter post by @bankonjustin

The New York Times correction offered readers a "pro tip" to avoid mistakes, advising: "Disable your Millennials to Snake People extension when copying and pasting."

The mistake appeared in an article fact-checking President Donald Trump's claims on trade deficits.

In 2016, Wired magazine made a similar mistake and published an article in which Donald Trump's name was replaced with "someone with tiny hands".

The error made it past the magazine's production team, who had assumed it was an intentional joke.

I want a satirical text-swapping web browser extension for Kung Fu Tai Chi...only I don't know what it would say.

[GeneChing]

Snake restaurant in Hong Kong to close after 110 years, marking end of an era
Family-run She Wong Lam in Sheung Wan was hugely popular, with actor Stephen Chow a regular customer. But its snake handler is nearly 90, and no one in the family wants to continue the business

PUBLISHED : Wednesday, 11 July, 2018, 6:48pm
UPDATED : Wednesday, 11 July, 2018, 7:20pm
Bernice Chan
bernice.chan@scmp.com
http://twitter.com/beijingcalling



One of Hong Kong’s oldest snake restaurants is closing for good, ending more than 110 years of history in Sheung Wan.

Family-run She Wong Lam was hugely popular in the 1960s and 1970s, but with no one from the family’s younger generation keen to continue the business of looking after snakes and preparing them for soup, the restaurant will close its doors on July 15.

According to Lo Tin-yam, the fourth-generation owner, She Wong Lam’s manager, Mak Dai-kong, is in his late 80s and has decided to retire, so the Lo family feels it is the right time to close the Hillier Street shop.

“Master Mak is almost 90 and he is the boss of the shop. He has worked for four generations of our family,” Lo says by phone from Vancouver, Canada. “Since my grandfather passed away, my father [Lo Yip-wing] didn’t know much about the snake business and I know even less,” he says.

His family trusts Mak but are unfamiliar with the shop’s other employees, making it hard for them to continue the business, he explains.


Mak joined She Wong Lam in 1948, when he was 18 years old. Photo: Oliver Tsang

Lo says the date for closing She Wong Lam was chosen by his uncle and father, the latter now in an old people’s home in Hong Kong. Lo, an accountant, and his younger sister have lived in Vancouver since he was about eight years old and he does not intend to return.

“It’s very difficult to find people to work in this particular industry. It’s not for everyone,” Lo says.

Mak joined She Wong Lam in 1948, when he was 18 years old, and the founder, Lo Tai-lam, encouraged him to help out around the shop and eat snake soup to help build his strength.


She Wong Lam in Sheung Wan in 1972. Photo: SCMP

Mak gradually learned how to handle snakes, remove their fangs, extract the gallbladder, and make the shop’s signature snake soup.

The ingredients of snake soup include the meat of various snake species, chicken, pork, sugar cane, mandarin peel, and white pepper. It is garnished with chrysanthemum petals and finely sliced lemon leaves.

“In the past, when I saw my colleagues handling snakes, they told me I didn’t have to be afraid of them,” Mak said in an interview with the Post late last year.


Bottles of snake wine for sale at She Wong Lam. Photo: James Wendlinger

“Once their fangs have been pulled out, they are not venomous … I remember my first attempts at handling snakes. I got bitten by them but it wasn’t painful at all. Since then, I have never been afraid of snakes.”

Sidney Cheung Chin-hung, professor and director of the Centre for Cultural Heritage Studies at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, has a copy of a flier from She Wong Lam promoting its snake gallbladder seasoned with ginger or pepper that dates back to 1910, and believes the shop was established in the early 1900s.

While fourth-generation owner Lo didn’t learn much about the snake business, he has a few fond memories to share about the business. The shop moved a few times during its more than 110-year history, but has always been in Sheung Wan. He also revealed how the shop got its name.

“My great-grandfather used to be busy in the back of the shop dealing with the snakes, and because people couldn’t see him, they assumed he was being lazy, which is why he got the nickname ‘Se Wong’, or ‘Snake King’,” says Lo. “She wong” is a Chinese euphemism for a lazy person.

Lo isn’t sure how or when his great-grandfather came to Hong Kong from the southern Chinese province of Guangdong, but Cheung is convinced the business was founded back in the dying days of the Qing dynasty.

One of his former anthropology graduate students, Esther Chok Wing-sum, says that in 1885 there were about 115 snake shops in Guangzhou. At the turn of the century, many snake handlers, including Lo’s great-grandfather, brought their knowledge and skills to the British colony of Hong Kong.

The younger Lo attributes the family’s financial success to the hard work of his great-grandfather and grandfather. At one point She Wong Lam sold snake gallbladder and soup not only in Sheung Wan, but at two other locations in the city.


Mak gradually learned how to handle snakes, and defang them. Photo: James Wendlinger

Hong Kong historian Cheng Po-hung says one of the shops was on the corner of Hennessy and Fleming roads in Wan Chai. The other was in Kowloon, he says, though no one we spoke to remembers the exact location.

Before the 1950s, Chok says, snake was a delicacy on par with shark’s fin and bird’s nest, which only the well-off could afford.

“A snake gallbladder was a few days’ salary at the time,” she explains. “It cost HK$20, but at that time the average person’s monthly salary was only HK$250.”

However, from the 1950s onwards, eating snake became increasingly affordable for the working class and grew more popular. “A bowl of snake soup would cost HK$8, but then it went down to HK$2 to HK$3,” Chok says.

continued next post

[GeneChing]

Snake soup served at She Wong Lam. Photo: Edmond So

Lo says there was a Chinese opera theatre in Sheung Wan in the 1960s, close to She Wong Lam, and opera singers would patronise the shop regularly, downing snake gallbladder with alcohol to boost their stamina.

Celebrities such as actor Stephen Chow Sing-chi and former senior police officer Tsang Kai-wing (actor Eric Tsang Chi-wai’s father) were regular visitors. Lo says Chow would tell the staff to contact him when they had a particularly large cobra in stock, such was his appetite for the snake.

Historian Cheng says he has tried the reptile’s gallbladder, which his friends used to buy regularly from other snake shops. “They put it in a spoon, or a shot glass, and added alcohol to it,” he says.

“One time a group of us drank the gallbladder of three different snakes mixed with alcohol … it was translucent green in colour and tasted bitter. People think it helps you become physically stronger, but the gallbladder has bacteria in it,” he says.

Despite She Wong Lam’s success, Lo’s elders were acutely aware of how important it was that a member of the next generation learn the snake trade if the business was to continue.

“My great uncle asked me when I was in my 20s if I would go into the business, otherwise no one else would do it. But I have my life in Canada. I’m 50 years old now and I don’t even live there [in Hong Kong],” he says.


Mak extracts the gallbladder, and then makes the shop’s signature snake soup. Photo: James Wendlinger

Lo points out that other traditional trades in Hong Kong, such as making lanterns, bamboo noodles, hand-carved mahjong tiles, and neon signs, are also disappearing.

The younger generation move away and can’t come back. [Old] Hong Kong will disappearLO TIN-YAM

“The younger generation move away and can’t come back,” he says. “[Old] Hong Kong will disappear and instead have shops like Zara, McDonald’s and Fairwood, especially with rent being so expensive.”

A search on restaurant guide OpenRice shows 36 restaurants with the Chinese character for “snake” in their name still open in Hong Kong, at least four of them with more than one location. They may not necessarily be specialists like She Wong Lam, however, nor have live snakes on the premises.


Snake boxes with the word ‘poisonous’ on them at She Wong Lam in Sheung Wan. Photo: James Wendlinger

Historian Cheng thinks there is still a decent number of places to get a bowl of snake soup, and doesn’t expect them all to close any time soon. He says the owners of Shia Wong Hip in Sham Shui Po, for example, have taught their siblings the snake trade, and adds there are still many snake shops in that neighbourhood and in Yau Ma Tei.

After the closure of She Wong Lam, the Lo family, which owns the shop space, will rent it out. In the meantime, Lo says, they have contacted the Hong Kong Museum of History about collecting the snake cabinets, cages and tables. The wooden cabinets are more than 100 years old.


Diners enjoy bowls of snake soup at She Wong Lam. Photo: AFP

Lo says Mak designed his own pocket knife to make a sharp slit to extract the snake’s gallbladder, and to skin it quickly and efficiently. According to Cheng, designing their own knives is common practice among those in the snake business.

For Lo, the closure of She Wong Lam is also the end of a long chapter in the family’s history, and tinged with sadness. Five years ago, Hong Kong public broadcaster RTHK made a documentary featuring Lo and his son Lo Yun-hei, then three years old, visiting the shop. At the time he hoped the business would continue to the fifth generation.

The reality is that the family respects Mak’s wishes to retire, and Lo hopes to keep the shop’s name alive. “I do have the intention to move back to Hong Kong when I retire, and I still have the rights to the name, so maybe I’ll open a restaurant with the same name,” Lo says.

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