Mother Reacted Quickly to Girl Holding Snake : Saugus: A paramedic says the toddler may have been lucky that she was bitten on the thumb.

Jenny Teichert could barely believe her eyes when her 20-month-old daughter Ann walked toward her in their Saugus living room holding a live rattlesnake.

“I thought to myself, ‘I can’t really be seeing this,’ and then I thought to myself, ‘Yeah, it’s a snake,’ ” Teichert said.

“I just kept thinking, ‘This isn’t happening.’ ”

The child was in satisfactory condition Thursday night at Kaiser Permanente Hospital in Hollywood after being bitten on her left thumb by the baby diamondback rattlesnake that had crawled into the family’s home, apparently through the door of an attached garage.

An eight-months pregnant Teichert was resting on the couch when she saw Ann pick up a fuzzy-looking object from behind a chair. “She walked toward me and was holding a snake by its middle,” she said.

“Ann was totally calm,” Teichert said. “I didn’t know if it had bitten her yet, so I just grabbed it from her and threw it on the floor and grabbed Ann and went to a neighbor’s house.” Teichert said she realized that Ann had been bitten when she saw blood running from her daughter’s thumb.

Larry Gorrindo, one of the paramedics who responded to the call, said the snake was about 18 inches long and was still in the middle of the living room at the house on Rain Lane when they arrived.

Gorrindo said the snake was placed in a small container and transported along with the girl to Childrens Hospital of Los Angeles so that doctors could determine the potency of its venom. He said the fact that the child was bitten on the thumb rather than on a part of her body closer to her heart may have prevented more serious consequences.

The snake was destroyed at the hospital, said Ann’s father, Karl Teichert, who added, “The biggest worry for me was that she could suffer nerve damage in her thumb from the swelling and possibly lose a finger.” She received 10 anti-venom shots.

But according to the Teicherts, Ann’s doctor said it appeared that surgery would not be needed and that she would probably be able to go home today from Kaiser Permanente, where she was transferred.

The Teicherts said they doubt that Ann, a chubby-cheeked blonde who recently began talking, is fully aware of what happened.

“She thought it was a toy,” Karl Teichert said. “Right now we’re just thankful to God . . . it could have been a lot more serious.”

Lt. George Enriquez, supervisor of the Los Angeles County Department of Animal Care and Control office in Castaic, said that in the past five years his office has gotten about 20 calls for snakes inside homes.

Enriquez said that snakes driven by hot weather into residential areas in search of food and water sometimes end up inside homes when people leave their doors open. With autumn at hand, cold weather will send the snakes into hibernation, decreasing the danger, he said.