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UPDATE BUMP
the coral snake in the earlier post died after 18 months- just stopped eating the skinks and snakes--
I have a slew off friends watching for snakes all the time- including the local animal control & pest control peeps, all the local POs- basically anyone who might get a call to deal with a snake---One friend is the Ice Cream dood- and since they spend many hours daily driving and often slowly they should see a lot--
SO... he called and had a coral snake for me in perfect condition AND by far the longest I have ever seen & I have seen many (I worked ~3 years at a mainly reptile zoo -critters found in the everglades) we always had corals to show and they too were hard to feed so many got turned loose when they appeared to be skinny-
ATM I have not measured this female (I think) but I am thinking she is ~36 inches long!!!
average full grown adult is only 20 to 30 inches and the record biggest in both Florida and Texas is slightly less than 48 inches which is VERY highly unusual.. and a huge Coral.
So.. with some luck it may be possible to grow this one a few inches bigger-- normally (in the wild) a snake eating well will grow as much as 12 inches in one year- once big the growth slows down-- thus to reach 48 inches I would need to keep her well fed for maybe as long as three more years. the lizard in the pic below is a Night Skink afaik the only common Tx lizard they normally eat- They will take most any small snake & I have fed my first one several ring-neck snakes-- We have many geckos and anoles BUT afaik they wont bite then eat one. Too bad as they are easy to find here..
If you think I may be a bit crazy for keeping a coral snake you may not really know them as well as you think-- the stats AFAIK- last person bittten and killed was in `1967--
At the zoo we regularly put our bare hands into their enclosure ( sawdust was used as substrate)
and gently lifted them above the sawdust so the visitors can see them ( they try to stay under something at almost all times) - to bite my hand they would need to feel trapped/distressed and need to bite me between my fingers or another small place that they can get their mouth open far enough for their short grooved fragile fangs to bite. They are so small its quite hard to see these fixed fangs(unlike the pitvipers whose fangs fold)
Maybe this will tell you about me and coral snakes-- When I got this one home I put it into a pillow case and THOUGHT I tugged on the overhand knot tight enough to keep her inside BUT she managed to crawl thru the knot and escape into my lkitchen and workshop (formally a dining room) for 4 hours I looked under most everything with mirror and LED light- I have a lot of boxes in my workshop and took a break when I was down to one corner of my shop-- I put some grub in the nuke and when the bell rang I went to get my grits and she had crawled from beneath my fridge. That was VERY lucky but maybe not for the reasons you are thinking-- I had NO fear of getting bitten- zero- I was bummed about losing her and the real possibility that she would eventually die in my house.
Me getting bitten?????
How could that possibly happen?? No way that I can think of...
In the USA the snake with the most potent venom is the coral (nerotoxic-paralizes you) but the most dangerous is NOT the Coral-- IMO that distinction goes to the diamond back and/or the water moccosin-- most bites are from Copperheads but its very rare for anyone to die from a copperhead bite (unless they fail to get treated)--
Its hard to see how big she is in these pics- and snakes are not always easy to measure--
The plexiglass enclosure is 19X19( the base) inches and when she crawled around her cage I saw her streatching from the end of one side to the far end of the other- so about 36 inches.
I have two 'hot rocks' in there and a small 'pool' with a pump that helps keep the water fresh longer-- I made a short hunt for food the day I put her into this enclosre and easily found two skinks- as of today at least one is still uneaten... maybe both-- It may have been a mistake on my aprt to NOT let her get 'setteld-in' before introducing food- when she found the water she immediatly drank for > a minute and came back twice to drink more -- so at least I know she wont die of dehydration--
WE also had a cold front move in and once these snakes get chilled & they go into a torpid state and wont eat-- So I may need to find some bugs for the skinks to eat lol..
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update
at WiKi see the death by snake list-- one a small number were NOT any fault of the person bitten--
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fatal_snake_bites_in_the_United_States
here is what is there on the last fatal bite from coral snake.
Note that many failed to get help quickly so the death was not entirtely caused by yhe snakes'
Inocenio Hernandez-Hernandez, 29, male June 10, 2006 Eastern Coral Snake Hernandez-Hernandez became the first person to die in the United States from a fatal coral snake bite since 1967. He and Jesus Moreida, both of Bonita Springs, Florida, were bitten by a coral snake they tried to kill.[14]
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If you read all these you will see in at least two cases another family member also died from Snakebite that happened during church.
The zoo I worked at was also in Bonita Springs
Take this little quiz
arrange these critters on the order pf most peole killed..
List of fatal bear attacks in North America
List of fatal cougar attacks in North America
List of fatal shark attacks in the United States
List of fatal alligator attacks in the United States
List of wolf attacks in North America
Fatal dog attacks in the United States
the pics
SAD UPDATE- the lid was not secured properly and he got away (in my car port)
my bad-but did learm much from this one and there will be moar...
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posting pics here for you- reply NOT ast this thread-PM or at my threads-let this one stay 'ended'
ok this kinda shows the scatter you get with 1W 445 JL PL-E first generation- some scatter-cant be seem in a beam- w/ glasses its gone- price reflects this 'issue' less than one hour of use. extra batt tube-spacers- bunch o batts. other goodies-- $175 yr choice black or silver host
the pics suck- the actual dot is fine the glare and my crap camera make it look much worse than it is. will try again
basicly it's just a pic and for real it's well a beam but kinda crap to be true 
