Later Life
Haast closed the Serpentarium in 1984, and moved to Utah for a few years. In 1990 he moved to Punta Gorda, Florida with his snakes, where he established the Miami Serpentarium Laboratories. Haast's hands suffered venom-caused tissue damage, culminating in the loss of a finger following a bite from a Malayan pit viper in 2003. As a result of the damage, Haast gave up handling venomous snakes, and no longer kept any at his facility. As of 2008 he continued to have his wife inject him with small amounts of snake venom. In an August 2008 Florida Trend interview, he stated, "Aging is hard. Sometimes, you feel useless. But I always felt I would live this long. It was intuitive. I always told people I'd live past 100, and I still feel I will. Is it the venom? I don't know."
Haast turned 100 in December 2010 and died on June 15, 2011.
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