Snake wine is known as the "long of a hundred medicines" in the folk, drinking snake wine has become a hobby of many people's lives, and there are even such rumors: the more poisonous the snake brewed wine, the stronger the medicinal effect. In rural areas, people who like to soak snake wine tend to choose larger and more venomous snakes, such as pit vipers and golden ring snakes.
However, in recent years, bizarre incidents of poisonous snakes "coming back from the dead" have occurred in various places, and serious ones have also caused deaths.
According to reports, there is a tradition of soaking snake wine in Guangxi and other places, and a villager once soaked a cobra in his own rice wine altar for 12 months. I thought that the cobra in the wine tank was dead, but when the villagers opened the rice wine altar, the poisonous snake suddenly came out and bit the neck of the villager. The next morning, the villagers were rushed to the hospital, but unfortunately the toxin spread so badly that they eventually died after ineffective rescue.
In 2012, a boy was hospitalized with a poisonous snake bite
Such bizarre events are not unique. In early June 2015, Ms. Liu of Heilongjiang asked a friend in the forest area for a live earth ball snake, put it in a wine tank, and opened the valve under the wine tank every day to drink a little, hoping to treat rheumatism. The earth ball snake is also called grass flying, seven inches, the scientific name of ussuri viper, proper poisonous snake. Ms. Liu soaked for 3 months, and during the brewing period, the pit viper was motionless, and there was no sign of life activity.
On September 3rd, there was not much "snake wine" left, and Ms. Liu opened the lid to prepare to add wine, but an unexpected thing happened: this pit viper actually "came back from the dead" and took the opportunity to bite on Ms. Liu's right hand! Fortunately, due to the timely injection of antivenom, Ms. Liu's body was not in serious trouble.
Many people are very confused: poisonous snakes soaked in high-concentration wine, 3 to 12 months do not eat or drink, why has not been "dead"?
First, the crux of the matter lies in the seal. Most of the folk brewers are not professional brewers, the brewing process and precautions are not clear, in the selection of wine bottles often use the common ordinary wine bottles on the market, poor sealing, improper operation is easy to leak.
The snake is a cold-blooded animal with tenacious vitality, and will enter a dormant state in the absence of oxygen, lack of water, low temperature and so on. Dormant venomous snakes have a very slow metabolism and weak breathing, and can survive for years even if they do not eat or drink. At this time, the snake can almost achieve zero energy consumption, so whether it is 3 months or 12 months, it is not too long for the poisonous snake in the snake wine.
Second, alcohol itself is also a volatile substance, if the closure is not tight, the amount of alcohol will slowly volatilize and escape, and the oxygen content will gradually increase. Even if a trace of oxygen is mixed in the bottle, the snake may take the opportunity to survive. What's more, when taking wine and drinking, it is also necessary to shake the bottle frequently, which may also make the snake's head surface and keep breathing.
Third, when the concentration of alcohol is not enough, the wrong operation method will also increase the hidden danger.
Bubble snake wine is a very exquisite process, generally use high-concentration wine, can be distilled wine, can also be prepared wine, but must meet the specified standards, the degree should be high enough.
There are three ways to brew wine, the first is to directly take a live snake to soak; the second is to slaughter the first snake, steam and dry before soaking wine; the third is to use snake dry to soak wine. In particular, the first type of live snake soaking, the most dangerous, the following treatment is crucial:
The snake should first be washed and starved for about a week. Before soaking, tighten the snake's stomach with your thumb and squeeze it from top to bottom all the way to the anus to completely drain the food in the abdomen. Finally rinse well and place in the wine. The ratio of snakes to wine is generally 1:5, and it should be ensured that the alcohol level is high enough and that the snake's head is completely submerged in alcohol.
After soaking, the storage time should start at least six months. Of course, if it is soaked in fake or inferior wine, it may not be able to kill the snake, but force it into a dormant state. Once there is more air in the bottle or the liquid surface is exposed to the head, the poisonous snake will slowly wake up and maintain a certain degree of vigilance, and the person may jump up when he opens the lid and bite into the palm of his hand or neck!
Killing the snake first and then soaking the wine is not necessarily safe. The problem is not with the snake, but with the wine.
First of all, there are many parasites in the internal organs of snakes, and drinking snake wine carries a risk of infection.
As a wild animal, there are many parasites in the snake's body, including snake tapeworm, Man's split-headed larvae, snake rod nematode, snake whipping tongue worm and so on. Take the Schizothorax mansonii as an example, this parasite mainly parasitizes in snakes and frogs, and it is difficult to kill it directly by brewing wine.
The parasitic rate of the Schizothorax mansonii on snakes is quite high. In 2009, the Hangzhou Municipal Center for Disease Control and Prevention caught 3 wild snakes in the local wild, found that the infection rate reached 100%, and detected a total of 116 Schizothorax mansonii! According to reports, the killing method of cleft head larvae needs to use a high temperature water body of 100 ° C and boil continuously for 2 minutes. If snake wine is not completely killed and drunk, schizocephalics may invade the human body, parasitize the eyes and brain, and seriously cause blindness and limb paralysis.
Secondly, snake wine may also become "poisonous wine". Snake venom and snake gall bladder there are a variety of venom proteins and polypeptides, if the use of inferior wine when brewing wine, the concentration is not high enough, the degradation rate of toxic substances will be very slow, drinking in advance is equivalent to drinking snake wine as "poisonous wine". In particular, the allogeneic proteins in snake bile take a long time to degrade, and have caused poisoning incidents in China many times.
Finally, alcohol itself is not a health supplement, and long-term alcohol consumption is also harmful to health. Many people think that "drinking and drinking in moderation is good for health", but in fact this is not the case at all. According to the world-famous magazine "The Lancet", drinking alcohol is not half good for human health, and the claim that drinking alcohol is beneficial is purely rumored.
On the list of 120 carcinogens released by WHO, alcohol is prominently listed, and it is also a first-class carcinogen, and the same level of carcinogens are betel nut, salted fish, tobacco. The health hazards of alcohol can be seen here.
In short, the use of snake wine needs to be cautious, in addition to the possibility of being bitten back, the hidden dangers of snake venom and parasites can not be underestimated, for the efficacy of snake wine, everyone is still calm as well.