Man Goes to Pick Up 'Stick' in a Walmart... Only to be Bitten by Poisonous Snake

LEWISTON, Idaho (The Blaze/AP) — A man says he reached down to pick up a stick lying in the outdoor gardening aisle of a Walmart in eastern Washington state, only to discover that it was a rattlesnake that then bit his hand.

Mica Craig says he was shopping in the outdoor garden department of a Clarkston store when he was bitten Saturday. The 47-year-old man says it latched onto his hand and that he screamed, shook loose the snake and stomped it to death. More specifically, according to the Lewiston Tribune, he said he "did a tap dance on it and got it killed."

The Tribune in Idaho reports a bystander drove Craig to an emergency room in nearby Lewiston. The Boise Weekly reports he was sent home at first without treatment as it was believed no venom was injected, but when he got home his arm had swelled to the "size of a cantaloupe." This time at the hospital, he said he received six bags of anti-venom and was told his hand would be permanently disfigured.

He says doctors expect him to remain hospitalized until Tuesday.

Walmart neither confirmed nor denied that the incident happened. Interestingly enough, this is by no means the first time a shopper has been bitten by a snake at Walmart. Here are cases reported in 2007, 2010 and 2011.

This story has been updated for clarity.