If accidental snakebites killed many white settlers and their domestic creatures in colonial Australia, far more animal deaths were deliberate. Venomous encounters details the ways in which the study of snakes and their venoms led to widespread adoption of vivisection across the Australian colonies, from 1788 until the First World War. Forcing direct bites or injections upon dogs and fowls, pigs and cattle, both lay antidote sellers and medical practitioners participated in this culture of experiment. Indeed, in 1881 the Colony of Victoria became the second legislature worldwide...