Survive Anything

I had no intention of writing an article today, but then a buddy of mine and I went into the woods behind his house to "plink" with the air rifle. We shot at the target, but inevitably got bored and started wondering around the woods like 6 year olds. We continued acting like 6 years old when we noticed a medium sized water moccasin curled up in the water next to a brush pile. It took about .549 seconds of thought before we knew we had to try and shoot it. I moved to an elevated spot where I had a clear line of sight and clear flight path for the pellet. I fired the shot, hit the snake directly in the bean, and it was floating instantly (dead). I was instantly gratified because not only is my favorite snake a dead snake, but it was a pretty good shot at around 20 meters. This was also the first live creature I had shot with the air rifle and I am pretty amazed at the power. Snakes are not ultra resilient animals, but it took it down faster than I had thought it would. The rest of this article will describe the process from kill to belly. Just as a warning, full color photos are posted in this article, so if you are weak stomached, close your eyes for those parts.

Step 1: After the snake is dead it will move for quiet some time. You need to get the head chopped off before you do anything. The longer you leave the head on the more likely the snake is going to be credited with an "afterlife kill". Pin the head down with a stick, stand on the stick, cut the head off 2-3 inches from the base of the head. The spine on a snake is stronger than you might think so a serrated edge helps.


a snake with no head!

Step 2: Split the snake the entire length of its body on the under belly side. We found this was easiest by starting in the middle and going towards the head, then starting from the middle and going towards the tail. Word of caution, about where the lighter color ends on the underneath side is where all the "gushy" organs are located. You are better off to cut that off rather than try and split all the way through the tail. Of course we cut it open because we are stupid and not only did horrible fluids go everywhere, the smell was not very friendly either.




As you can see rupturing the bladder makes a surprisingly big mess. I enhanced this with scratch-n-sniff technology so if you are man enough test it out...

Step 3: Work from the head end and start scrapping out the guts. There is a white film inside keeping everything attached and scrapping that away keeps everything in tact. It is very similar to gutting a fish.

This shows a clear picture of the white lining, cut and follow that the entire length of one side of the snake

Once you have one whole side done, start "rolling the guts over the side while you trim away and push the guts over the side as demonstrated here.

Step 4: Remove skin, the skin comes off incredably easy. Use the knife to scrape off a piece big enough to grab, then pull! Thats all there is to it.

"Starter" portion of the skin

Pull!

Step 5: Clean and eat. Make sure you cook it thouroughly. Snake is not sushi and can be harmfull if eaten less than cooked. All meat needs to reach a minimum of 140 degrees to ensure any potential parasites are killed. The best way to do this is wrap it around a stick and cook it on a hot fire for a long time.