السلام عليكم ورحمة الله وبركاته
1. In light of situations that might and do arise, the need for expert snake handlers in society is readily recognized.
2. Since this need can be adequately satisfied only by the type of exposure and experience you raise in your question, such exposure and experience would be considered permissible as an exception from the general rule, but not as a replacement of the rule itself.
3. Accordingly, where the keeping of snakes would be permitted, it would not be as a general social hobby, but as an exception narrowly circumscribed by the extent of the need.
4. Aside from the benefit of snake-handling for the removal of snakes from areas where humans live, the Sharīʿah does not recognize any particular value in keeping snakes, neither
the harmful nor the harmless sort.
5. Acquisition and keeping of the harmless types for any reason other than developing expertise in removal is therefore a futile activity that should not be encouraged beyond the
scope of need.
6. The Sharīʿah is not at pains to eradicate ophidophobia. On the contrary, the attitude of hostility to, and fear of snakes which the term describes is very much acknowledged and affirmed as an intrinsic human trait in the hadith wherein RasūluLlāh 
says:
والله تعالى أعلم
And Allah knows best
(Issued: February 2019)
