Overview
- Over the weekend, Stevenson Ranch resident Linda Martin was bitten while tending roses and felt tingling move from her fingertips into her face within a minute, symptoms that prompted immediate action.
- Martin tried to call 911 but could not connect because of spotty cell service, so her husband drove her about 10 minutes to Henry Mayo Newhall Hospital for care.
- At the hospital she received antivenom and is recovering at home after doctors treated the rapid-onset systemic symptoms.
- The California Poison Control System reports 250 rattlesnake-bite calls in the first six months of 2026 versus a little over 400 for all of 2025, a trend its director says could mean roughly a 20% increase this year tied to a warm early spring.
- Experts urge simple prevention and first-aid steps—wear boots near brush, avoid bare feet, move as little as possible after a bite, and get to a hospital quickly while avoiding tourniquets or heat packs—and authorities note California has recorded three venomous-snake deaths so far in 2026.