This brown snake was way too close to, well, everything, and seemed more interested in parking itself rather than just passing through. Photo: Sally Hopman.
Yep, welcome to that time of year again when normal people swear like their lives depend on it – and reptiles must wonder why they don’t just turn over and slither back into hibernation.
The first brown snake of the season greeted me near the dirt turn-off to the farm a couple of days ago, probably checking my address on its phone.
I’m surprised it, my address, is not in neon on the Brown Snakes of [Insert Name of Town Here] Community Noticeboard page – but I guess it just relies on its SIM card (Snake in Motion) to track me down.
I’m hoping the line all the wildlife carers spin you (mostly the spider ones but the others do as well) when you call them hysterically to say there’s a brown in the laundry/kitchen/under the clothesline – “don’t worry, it’s just passing through” – is true. But passing through where? To the car, lounge, under the doona?
Here’s hoping it will be not so slimy a year as it has been, otherwise I’m heading to that apartment in Manuka that’s about 20,000 metres ASL (Above Snake Level).
After only about 20 years, I’ve finally worked out their pattern. (Actually that’s the only thing I like about them – the stunning pattern on their back. And I’ve spent a lot of time studying it, waiting for someone brave to arrive. This “studying” usually takes place from as far away from the snake as possible – behind doors, windows, really large fences and tall, wide men.
I try to avoid using animals and/or children as animal or childish shields, I really do, but it’s not always possible. And I always give them first dibs with the shovel*.
Yes, I know it’s my fault. Me and the rest of the human race, except for those wonderful volunteers. First, we’ve encroached on the native animals’ land so while some have moved on, others have stubbornly stayed. Humans may be larger, but snakes give well documented meaning to the word “venom”.
So they stay around, sleep around all winter only poking their slimy little heads out when they hear me yelling at whomever will listen, “who took my thongs?” Thongs? Naked toes? Time to wake up.
The bark of this Diamond python is far worse than its bite – but try telling that to Sally Hopman. Photo: Kim Treasure.
They watch from their vantage points as the pattern begins. The foxes eat the birds that eat the rats that eat the mice that eat the chook food that always has a hole in its bag. Then humans go and eat the chooks.
But this year, a fat feral cat took up residence under the house. She’s about the size of a Volkswagen – mainly because she always seems to be pregnant, and hates me. She’s untouchable, and clearly too tough even for snakes.
This monster could eat for Australia, and has scared the life out of my dog, which isn’t really that impressive when you consider he can’t see and can only hear when you unwrap plastic from cheese next to his ear.
But Monster Cat seems to have devoured every mouse and rat in a 10km vicinity. Even the hay shed across the road from the house has just, well, hay in it.
Just as I managed to swap the image of the first brown with that of Mr Darcy coming out of the farm dam wearing a sodden white shirt – well he was brown with mud – the first black snake appeared. Right in front of my car tyre. It was almost daring me to run it over and I so wanted to, being the horrible person that I am. But then I did something novel. I thought before I acted.
I just knew that although it was dead in front of my tyre, I would somehow miss it and it would, instead, wind its way up the front of the car and just appear at the windscreen next time I got in, giving me, if it could, the finger. (Dead in the sense of wishful thinking, not dead in front of my tyre.)
Welcome to Snake Season.
*No animal, child or shovel were injured in the making of this story.
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