Westserve

A herpetological interlude

Last Monday and Tuesday, I spent painting the outside of my parents Hardiplank house at Wentworth Falls in the Blue Mountains. Dad turns 80 in March, and climbing ladders and wielding paint rollers is getting a bit beyond him.
So, Sam, Ben and Lorien, my brother Geoff and his son Chris attacked the house with the intention of finishing the whole job in the two days. We didn’t quite make it, but we did have an interesting diversion on the Tuesday.
I walked round the corner and into the garage to get more paint – just in time to nearly tread on the tail of a meter long snake. I stepped back very smartly, and he continued on his way to disappear into the large amount of garage ‘stuff’ that occupies the rear third of the area.

WIRES to the rescue
I had no idea what kind of snake he was at this stage, but a phone call to Wires soon had a snake handler on his way. At this stage, the snake re-appeared on top of the cluttered workbench at the back of the garage, and we had an eye-to-eye standoff from a distance of about 3 metres (hoping to keep him occupied until the handler came).

Not so bright snake
But then he proved that snakes aren’t as intelligent as they are made out to be. He decided to try for a gap in the back wall of the garage and promptly fell into a polypropelene garden rubbish bag in a spring-loaded frame. Being too deep for him to climb out, we were able to bring the bag and frame out onto the driveway.
Five minutes later, the snake handler arrived, to tell us it was a Copperhead and while highly venomous, he told us, it wasn’t at all aggresive. Except that as the words left his mouth, the snake lunged for his hand!
But it all ends well. The Copperhead was safely bagged and was released in bushland about 10 minutes later.
And it was a welcome diversion from the painting…