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In the palm of my hand is one of the most venomous snakes in the United States. The cottonmouth. Oh, it's so close. Oh, did it get through the glove? Every year, thousands of people stumble upon venomous snakes, and the last thing you want to have happen is to take a bite. Unless you're me. In today's extreme experiment, I'm going to be testing the bite of the venomous cottonmouth snake. But first, we've got to find one. Okay, on the search for water moccasins. Perfect environment. We got the light coming like this
through the trees. So, up against any of these cypress knees or logs that are exposed to the sun is a perfect spot to be searching. My heart skipped a beat for a second. This is literally the most perfect location I've ever seen to find a cottonmouth. We're only uh maybe a quarter of the way around this body of water any minute now. Matt spots a cottonmouth. That's right, man. Nice. Perfectly camouflaged, dude. I just walked right next to the snake and I didn't even see it. Holy crap. Good spot, dude. Thank you. Wow. Nice little cotton. I think this is a snake we can grab with the gloves. Oh my goodness. And
you can actually see the fangs right there in the front. Let's see if it'll just stay put. And let's get a couple of cool shots of the inside of his mouth with a better camera. Okay, now we're going to get into it. Ray, what are we doing here? Okay, so I'm going to put on our new pair of supposedly snake bite-proof gloves. And first, what I'm going to do is kind of creep up on this snake and just kind of get my hand in there to see if it will bite. So far, been around the snake for about 5 minutes. It's given us every possible display of defense
that it has, but has not attempted to strike. So, we're going to put that to the ultimate test and kind of play off the snake's behavior from there. Maybe I'll be able to pick it up with my hands, pull it out here to give a better presentation and actually hold a venomous cottonmouth, which is nothing you should ever do. So, if we're ready, I'm going to slip on these gloves. So, these are the new gloves from Hex Armor. New gloves. They're black instead of gray. Little stiff. They need to be uh worn in a little bit, but here we go. So, going to kind of get level with the snake. I'm just outside of its potential strike range. It is
uh not every day you get face to face with a venomous cottonmouth just like this. And this is uh kind of what you'd call like a teenager in age. It's not quite a juvenile but not a full grown adult. You can see a little bit of like brownish patterning along its body and that fades away over time as this snake grows in age. I also for context have on a bite proof glove just in case my hand gets close. This is uh this is as gritty as it gets. And like I said, never ever attempt something similar to this. So, you guys got good shots? Looking good. So, what I'm going to do is get its attention over here. If
you guys are ready, I'm going to give us a little countdown and reach my hand in. Three, two, one. And one thing to keep in mind, this is a pit viper, so they are able to pick up on heat signatures that every living thing gives off. and it's probably not picking up much of one if at all with my hand in the glove. Just senses this big object because there's no heat being sensed from the glove that's probably provoking the snake, not necessarily to strike. Right. And another thing to keep in mind is the venom of this cottonmouth is designed for prey items, not necessarily for predators. They will use it as a defense mechanism,
but only in a last resort scenario, which we might be putting ourselves in here. So, I'm going to kind of wave my hand around just a little bit more. Are you nervous to get your finger much closer than that? I mean, it's not struck yet, which is a really cool sign that this snake is not overly aggressive, but the approach to actually picking the snake up very gently. How are you going to go about that? There seems to be some room where I can wiggle my fingers underneath its body and it's curled up. Maybe it'll just sit in my hand and I can kind of get it out here into a more open environment. But as for nerves, I don't get nervous very often,
but my hands shaking a little bit because this goes against everything I have been taught or read about uh throughout my whole life. This is what we call an extreme experiment. Testing out Hex Armor's bite-proof gloves. We've done this before with a copper head and now we're attempting it with the water moccasin. And what would actually be really cool here is if Ray is able to pick this snake up without it striking at all. Although I have a feeling that once he tries to slide his hand underneath, something crazy is going to happen. All right, here we go. Ray,
camera coming back to you. I think I'm going to get in a little bit of a better position here. Hey, buddy. Good strike under the can spring forward. Holy cow. Okay, you can see my hand shaking just a little bit. Laser focused on me right now. Look how much it's puffed up its body. It is in the biggest defense pose it possibly has. And that mouth is just gaped open. I'm staring those fangs down. Oh my goodness. Hey buddy, I don't want to get any closer than that. And for context, to compare this to the copperhead bite that we went through just a few months ago, these
two pit vipers are very closely related, but they are also vastly different. This snake has a much more potent venom than a copperhead. If I were to be tagged, we are immediately rushing to the hospital. But also, behavior- wise, this is a lot different than a copperhead. Copperheads are, of course, very reluctant to bite, but incredibly shy snakes. they are more prone to just flee if you come across them. Whereas co cottonmouths you see here display that bright white mouth puff up their body and just kind of stand their ground. Something you don't really see with copper heads. I think personally one of the craziest
things about this moment is that uh the snake has not struck a single time. No. And even you gently lifting it up like this, it's pretty much just chilling out. Still got some leaves there underneath it and it's thinking I'm not even going to move my pose. I'm just gonna stay like this and hopefully nobody gets any closer. It is the perfect display because cottonmouths maybe more than any other venomous snake here in the United States get a bad rap. So many people think of them as aggressive. They target people. They'll chase after you in the environment. Obviously, that is not the case. It's just standing its ground. And I mean,
I am literally holding this cotton mouth in the palm of my hand and it has no interest in biting yet. All right. Well, I think everybody that wants to see whether or not the snake is going to bite through those gloves is ready for you to put your finger in front of that snake's face. Okay. Well, here we go. The official cottonmouth bite test. Here we go. Three, two, one. Look at that. Yeah. Boop him on the nose. Little boop. No interest in me at all. Maybe boop it on the underside. Wow. This is maybe the best display in internet history that cotton
mounts and most venomous snakes in general do not want to strike unless absolutely necessary. I now wonder what happens if you kind of like freehandled the snake a little bit more and slither from one hand to the next. Snake is almost a paid actor there. As soon as you said that, okay, okay, now he's now watch. Yep. Oh, you're okay, buddy. You're okay. Yeah. Yeah, I want to grab the snake closer to the head so it can't potentially get up and get my arm or even my legs. Okay, I'm putting myself in a good position here for a bite. I'm going to try to grab it closer to the head. I'm going to go no bite.
No bite. Wow. Which is pretty cool to see, honestly. Oh, it's so close. Oh, holy cow. Okay, first of all, we are good. It did not get through the gloves. Oh my god, the power in that strike. Take a look at my finger there. You can see huge droplets of venom on the tip of my finger. Not sure if you're going to be able to make that out on camera. Holy cow, guys. Do you see how quick that strike was? That just goes to show you. Woo! No matter how on point you can be around a venomous snake, they are always quicker than you. This snake is Okay, now that we have a bite, this
snake is kind of getting a little out of control. Let's see if we can just go ahead and like nestle him up in that corner there and see get it to calm down. I want you to get Easy now. Easy now. So, this snake is definitely just going to skirt away. Okay, let's let him go and then we'll I mean, it took everything to get that snake to bite. And obviously, we weren't going to force that snake to bite me today, but holy cow. I mean, we got to be careful with this glove. It is dripping with venom. And I mean, I It goes to show you when you're working with potentially
dangerous animals or any wild animals in general, you are never actually in full control. You always have to remember that. Unpredictability is huge out here. That snake struck at the very second. I didn't think it was. It had some impact, bro. Oh my god. Yeah. My whole body, my whole soul left my body for a second there when it struck. Because you have that that second after the bite where you're like, "Did it get through?" Like I felt the impact like every ounce of power on my finger there. I felt. But then I was like, "Okay, hold up. We're good."
It did not get through the gloves. So you took a bite from a copperhead, took a bite from a water moccasin. Yep. Fangs didn't get through the bite proof gloves. Yeah. We have uh tested these gloves against two of the most common venomous snakes here in the United States, but there are two still missing on our list, the infamous eastern and western diamondback rattlesnakes. And yeah, I say after this we go and try to tackle those in the future. But until next time, I'm Ray Tiller. Be brave, stay wild. I'll see you guys on the next adventure.
