Tiger Snake
Two weeks prior to Christmas, I was home alone, walked in to the kitchen to give the dog his dinner and stopped, in shock. There, slithering away from the door, was a fat, black snake! A friend down the road came up with his rifle and a mate, armed with a shovel but couldn't find it.
After that incident, we've been very protective of our little dog and accompany him outside. On Christmas Eve, in the morning, Michael was outside with him and watching him as he chewed on some couch grass in the garden. All of a sudden he twisted his head to the left, which Michael saw and told him to get inside. He grabbed the shovel at the door and proceeded to hack away at the garden, then lifted a tiger snake out, threw it on the lawn and whacked it. It was a very tense few moments; he said that the snake was hissing and having a go at the shovel.
Snake was just behind the lady
(I was standing at the kitchen door)
(I was standing at the kitchen door)
Michael raced Tajie to the vet and they held him there for four hours, testing his urine three times. Because the garden is quite thick there, the snake probably had a problem aiming or had just knocked him on the face. So we didn't have to pay the $2000 for the anti-venom, only $130 for the tests!
Just last week, Michael was outside at the BBQ cooking our steaks, when he looked over at the garden and saw the Japanese Windflower move....there was no wind. The next thing I know he's hacking at the garden again! This time he pulled out a red-bellied black from exactly the same spot the tiger was in!
Red-bellied Black
We've had a lot of rain lately and we think that the snakes have been flushed out of the 16 acres of ponds next door and are seeking higher ground. In the eleven years we've been here, we've only seen 3 snakes, until now. Added to these three lately, Michael came across a dead Brown Snake with no head down near our front fence. He thinks he may have chopped it with the mower the day before.
Tajie keeping an eye on a little Skink;
he didn't even bother getting up,
just watched it slither over the carpet!
