A Little Off the Top: A good, slithering, cold-blooded legacy

Millions of people around the world paid homage to "Crocodile Hunter" Steve Irwin earlier this month, following his death from a stingray barb a few weeks ago, and I'm one of the many people who regretted — but wasn't surprised by — news of his death.

Other than having some Australian relatives, I share something in common with Steve that not too many people can relate to — a love of snakes.

You wouldn't believe the looks I get when I tell people that I love snakes. Actually, you probably would, since most of you reading this consider snakes to be gross, ugly, dangerous, and/or just plain not cuddly.

Perfectly understandable.

I don't know where my fascination with snakes comes from. In trying to type this column, I realized I couldn't even articulate why I am fascinated by them.

I just am.

And that's why I was really sad to hear that Steve died. But I wasn't surprised to find out that it was while filming a segment for his popular TV show. What was surprising is that it was from a stingray.

I have watched The Crocodile Hunter TV show dozens of times, and sat there in awe of some of the things Steve did with snakes. For most of you who watched his show, handling a rattlesnake, for example, is no different than picking up an Australian brown snake, or a hooded cobra — it's a pretty stupid thing to do.

I still have the video I taped of Steve catching a black mamba in Eastern Africa. While there are a half-dozen or more species with deadlier venom, few of them have the temper of the black mamba.

If you are bitten by a mamba, you have about two hours to say your goodbyes. To be bitten by a mamba and survive puts you in an elite category. To intentionally set out to catch one, and hold it in your hand without being bitten, is incredible.

In the end, it was a stingray barb. The fact that he didn't die from a taipan, mamba or brown snake bite is a little ironic, since those bites are infinitely more dangerous, but that's the way it goes I guess.

And that's what Steve did, and he loved sharing his knowledge of snakes with the world. It was what snakes needed most — an ambassador that could show people that snakes, for better or worse, play a valuable role in our ecosystem.

Ask any kid who the Crocodile Hunter was, and chances are they are able to tell you. And that's the real tragedy behind his death, is that there's a gaping hole in the educational TV community now to teach people about the wonders of snakes.

I wish I could help fill that void.

Sometimes you think about that "dream job" that you've always wanted but somehow aren't qualified for. My dream job would be to go around to elementary schools and teach kids about snakes. I'd have four or five non-poisonous ones that I could hold and show them, and I'd go before the school board and ask permission to bring one or two poisonous ones along, too.

They probably wouldn't go for that, for liability reasons.

I'd teach kids that snakes are basically harmless, and I would tell them how many rats and mice they eat each year, which saves crops and reduces disease. I'd teach them how to identify poisonous and non-poisonous ones, and how some snakes eat other snakes, and all kinds of neat stuff.

Then I'd pack up my boxes of snakes and go to the next school. The kids would just call me the "snake man" and I'd be fine with that.

One day, one of my snakes would get ornery and bite me on the hand, and I'd drop the snake momentarily, and cuss, and all the kids would run out of the room screaming cause there's a live snake on the floor, and then I wouldn't get invited back after the school board found out about it — the bite and the cussing — and that would be the end of my career as the snake guy.

I'm sure somewhere there are people who do that for a living — one guy with turtles and snakes came to my elementary school — but it would be hard to find funding for that, and so my dream sits dormant.

Most people are happy to just view snakes on TV, and that's fine. Not me. I actively go looking for them whenever I can.

When I visited by grandparents in Florida, most normal people would head for the beach. I'd go to the local wildlife sanctuary and hunt for snakes.

I was happy as a clam when I found a big, fat cottonmouth sunning himself (herself? — there's actually a way to tell, but I wouldn't recommend trying to find out with a cottonmouth) — by the water, and I'd just sit there for an hour or so and watch him.

Florida is snake-central. The state has everything an amateur herpetologist could want, but growing up in Virginia was nice, too. We probably have more black rat snakes than anyone else. You know, just the run-of-the-mill black snake.

In the summertime, you couldn't drive more than 50 feet down the dirt roads my neighbors and I lived on without finding a dead black snake, that was just trying to get some sun. It's like seeing deer on the side of the road in the Swan.

Most people don't mind running over snakes, and some of them do it intentionally, but I'd get out of my car, stop traffic and actually pick a snake up and move him to the side of the road. You wouldn't believe the looks I got.

One of the best experiences of my life was visiting my brother in Uganda, when he lived there for a year. Later, we went to the reptile zoo in Kenya, and I got to sit and stare at a whole tank full of mambas, a half dozen different types of cobras, and all kinds of other snakes found in Eastern Africa.

I don't know why other people aren't as fascinated by snakes as I am. But for all of you out there who think an animal has to be cute, cuddly or pretty to be worthwhile, Steve was there to show you otherwise.

In his death, snake-lovers like me lost a real advocate, and non-snake lovers lost a source of education. I hope somebody steps in to fill the shoes he left behind.

I'd volunteer to do it, but I'd probably lose an arm to a croc during the first week of filming, or die from a cobra bite. I can just see the headlines: "Moron picks up cobra, gets bitten."