On a Sunday afternoon I walked into the kitchen to get some juice for the children when I saw a snake disappear behind some things. In the seven years we live in the bush now we got used to encounters like this so I stayed quite calm. I first got the juice for the kids and brought it out. Because I didn’t want to risk losing the snake and having him startle me later I got our snake-stick. This is a stick of about a metre long with on one side a sort of a beak that you can open and close with a handle on the other side of the stick. My friend happened to be visiting that day with her one year old son. She lives in the bush as well and has even more experience with snakes
in her house and garden than I have. She kept the kids at a distance while I carefully pulled some things aside. We caught a quick glance of the snake before it moved even further back, but it was enough for her to recognise it as a cobra. The cobra is a poisonous snake that can be aggressive when it is cornered. The Egyptian or spitting cobra can spit its venom 3 metres far. Because we weren’t sure which kind of cobra we were dealing with I put on my goggles to protect my eyes, just in case. With the stick I pulled more things aside until I could see the snake. Carefully I brought the open beak to the snake’s neck and closed it. My friend took the children outside so I could take the snake out. The snake was about a metre long and curled its body around the stick while we had a look at it. Niels also had a look, from a safe distance, before I went to release the snake outside our fenced area. It quickly went into the bushes and hopefully it got such a fright that it doesn’t come back.
in her house and garden than I have. She kept the kids at a distance while I carefully pulled some things aside. We caught a quick glance of the snake before it moved even further back, but it was enough for her to recognise it as a cobra. The cobra is a poisonous snake that can be aggressive when it is cornered. The Egyptian or spitting cobra can spit its venom 3 metres far. Because we weren’t sure which kind of cobra we were dealing with I put on my goggles to protect my eyes, just in case. With the stick I pulled more things aside until I could see the snake. Carefully I brought the open beak to the snake’s neck and closed it. My friend took the children outside so I could take the snake out. The snake was about a metre long and curled its body around the stick while we had a look at it. Niels also had a look, from a safe distance, before I went to release the snake outside our fenced area. It quickly went into the bushes and hopefully it got such a fright that it doesn’t come back.
This was not the first adventure we had with snakes her in the South African bush. There was the time that we had a, harmless, spotted bush-snake in our shower. Last year we had a boomslang (tree snake) in the tree next to our office and we once had a nest of puff adders, so I found five young puff adders around our terrace in one week. We had a cobra before as well; it was hiding behind the toy box of Niels! At that stage we didn’t have the snake-stick yet and we chased it off with a normal stick. After this adventure we decided to buy the snake-stick.
Bush regards from Balule
Miriam
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