A study of bacterial contamination of rattlesnake venom.

Several investigators have studied cold-blooded animals in terms of contamination by different types o f organisms. Hinshaw and M cN eil4 isolated Salm o­ nella rubislaw from 3 out o f 12 Sceloporus occi­ d e n t a l specimens. Zwart24 reported the iso­ lation o f Salmonellae from 37.5% of lizards. LeN oc and Brygoo9 isolated 58 different types o f sal­ monellae from 48 out o f 127 chameleons examined. In studies on snakes captured in Pará and in lower Am azonia (Brazil), L ins1011 showed that 11.31% o f the animals examined were infected with salmonellae. Kourany et al.8 detected salmonellae in 27.3% o f lizards and 6.5% of toads examined. Moreno et a l 14, in a study o f 613 cold-blooded animals raised in captivity, most o f which were snakes, detected in 271 animals several bacterial species, such as Citrobacter, Proteus vulgaris, Proteus m organii and Pro­ teus rettgeri as well as several types o f salmonellae. This led the authors to emphasize the high incidence of contamination with salmonellae among snakes. Despite good physiological conditions of the snakes several investigators have found high indices o f contamination. Thus, Furlanetto et al 3 detected high levels o f contamination with enterobacteriaceae and other bacteria in an epizooty caused by a diphthe­ roid bacterium among snakes raised in an ani­ mal house. This bacillus caused a disease among these snakes that had not been reported before. The disease affected 70.0% of snakes of the genera B othrops and C rotalus whose venom was going to be used for the preparation of antibothrops and anticrotalus sera. The snakes were vaccinated with a Wright-type vaccine prepared from the diphtheroid bacillus detected, which was highly effective in lowe­ ring the level o f infection from 70% to 0.4%. Several investigators have attempted to esta­ blish a bacterial standard for the mouth flora o f snakes