It stand to reason that gaiters do some good - when they can't escape, most snake strikes are below the knees, about 3 feet in front of them. Gaiters protect basically to knee height, and mine anyway ($25 REI version) are made of 400-500 denier cordura, which would take a heck of a bite to make it through to my skin. If I'm wearing gaiters over ankle length pants, even less likely a snake bite will make it through.