The man required 26 doses of anti-venom after he was bitten by the four-foot snake after it had died.
Jennifer Sutcliffe told local station KIII-TV that her husband had been working in the garden when he saw the rattlesnake and decapitated it.
As he went to remove the snake from the garden the severed head bit him.
According to Ms Sutcliffe her husband immediately began to suffer seizures and was airlifted to Corpus Christi hospital where he was given anti-venom.
The man is reportedly in stable condition but has some weakened kidney function.
A rattlesnake’s bite can be triggered up to several hours after it dies.
Specialists have warned against attempting to kill snakes by cutting them up.
"It's cruel to the animal and it leaves you with a smaller piece that's venomous to pick up," Leslie Boyer, an anti-venom doctor at the University of Arizona VIPER Institute told Gizmodo news site.
