another photo of the kingsnake

great picture !

Not a big fan of snakes. We see a lot of them around here too. Thankfully most of them are tree snakes and harmless, although occasionally we get the nasty ones!

well, Australia has all the nasties! Our nasty ones are a little different - not as aggressive as yours - and around here we only have 4 venomous species. I do have copperheads around the house, found a baby last year, but as a former reptile keeper at Zoo Atlanta I like all snakes. well, with the exception of large pythons; I'd rather deal with a venomous snake than a large constrictor.

Now that's one job I could never do! Reptile keeper must have been an interesting line of work. I know here I've only ever seen an enormous Python once. It was around 3 metres long. Actually we think it was probably longer but we just couldn't see the end of it. It was crawling along one of the beams of our pergola in the night-time and we decided not to get too close. Venomous ones we've seen here include a Coastal Taipan and an Eastern Brown. Nasty, nasty, nasty things! The Common Tree snake is seen on almost a daily basis around here and I often spot one hanging around our verandah and/or courtyard.

I think it's tellling that at the zoo, we could work with venomous snakes without a colleague in the room but we could not work with the 18' long reticulated pythons alone. When Sean fed them I had to stand behind him with a pole, just in case. With most venomous snakes you have time to get to safety and get help. But one of those huge fellows? If they nab you & start constricting and you're alone, you're probably dead.

A friend of mine used to breed reticulated pythons. She had a 15 footer named Monster. Monster was always a very gentle snake, and the local kids liked to visit with him. One day she had him out on the front porch and he was coiled loosely around her as usual. One of the kids came from a home with lots of dogs and cats, and Monster must have picked up on their smell, because he began to constrict Nancy. There was nothing she could do but just relax her body as much as possible and pray that he'd think she was dead and release her, which thankfully was what happened. She rehomed all of them after that.

Oh my goodness! How fortunate that Nancy knew exactly what to do! Most of us would just freak out and have no chance!

I know that further north, towards the rainforest areas, a couple of little children have unfortunately been killed by pythons. They had no chance the poor things.

I would have freaked out!!!!

Wow!!! So many Story's Of Snake's,Australia. Has Got Lots Of Nasty Snakes. My Son Lives In Queensland.And He Told Me He Found One A Sleep On The Front Door Mat. And The Dreaded Red Back Spider. Not My Cup Of Tea.