An elderly well-known snake enthusiast has died after being bitten by a rattlesnake in West Virginia last week, his family said.
William H. “Marty” Martin, 80, was killed Aug. 3 after being bitten by a thunder tree on his property in Harpers Ferry, West Virginia, according to his wife, Renee Martin.
Despite his age, Martin regularly made the arduous trek to local mountains to document snake populations in remote locations, according to Joe Villari, manager of the Bull Run Mountain Preserve in northern Virginia.
“He was about 80 years old and hard to maintain,” said Villari, who would join Martin on his semi-annual excursions.
Martin was perhaps the nation’s leading expert on timber rattlesnakes — a species that is notoriously hard to find — which he had studied since he was a child, according to John Seeley, a rattlesnake researcher in Stocksdale, North Carolina.
“They are extremely secretive animals,” Seeley said.
Snake bites are rarely fatal. The Centers for Disease Control estimates that they cause about five deaths a year in the US.
Dan Keiler, a professor of toxicology at the University of Minnesota and an expert on snake bites, said a second snake bite can be more deadly than the first for some people.
Rattlesnakes in particular can be more dangerous if they grow to a size that allows them to inject more venom, and a person’s age affects their susceptibility, he said.
Martin has been bitten before in his career, but has bounced back.
Villari said wood rattlers tend to be docile, avoid human contact and often won’t bite even if accidentally stepped on.
“They save their venom for their prey,” he said.
With postal wires
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