Brian Barczyk, a Reptile Evangelist on YouTube and TV, Dies at 54

Brian Barczyk, a world-famous reptile expert whose upbeat videos attracted millions of fans on social media and who starred in the reality TV show “Venom Hunters” on Discovery, died on Sunday at his home in Michigan. He was 54.

The cause was pancreatic cancer, according to Stephanie Kent, a representative for The Reptarium, a reptile zoo that Mr. Barczyk founded with his wife, Lori Barczyk, in Utica, Mich.

Mr. Barczyk’s love of reptiles began as a boy. He has said his earliest memory was coming across a ball python at the Belle Isle Aquarium in Detroit.

“I remember that like it was yesterday, and ever since, I’ve just been obsessed,” Mr. Barczyk told the Hollywood Soapbox in 2016. “No one taught me this obsession. I always tell people, I was born with a reptile gene because it’s just in me. I spent every summer catching garter snakes out in the local woods.”

A native of Southeast Michigan, Mr. Barczyk spent decades commercially breeding snakes. His company, BHB Reptiles, had tens of thousands of the reptiles in a warehouse at any given point, Mr. Barczyk told The Detroit Free Press in 2015. His customers included Saul Hudson, better known as Slash, the guitarist from Guns N’ Roses.

His rise to prominence began with the 2008 launch of an educational YouTube channel, SnakeBytesTV, as well as posting from his personal web page. The videos are cheerful how-tos on various snake-related topics, including some in which Mr. Barczyk explains how to safely breed and transport them, how to deal with snake bites and why, contrary to popular opinion, the bites aren’t so bad (depending on the snake).