We have spent the last week peering out of the 'office' window across the road at the neighbours house. More specifically at the wall of the house. And more specifically still, at the ledge at the bottom of the wall where the stone cladding stops and the plain wall begins. And the reason is this, see below!
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| Look at the huge eye! |
Yes, a boomslang, one of the most deadly snakes around. And they usually live in trees, hence the name 'boomslang', treesnake. This one was in a tree, well in a large shrubby bush which in this area counts as a tree! Anyway, the neighbours chopped the bush down because of the danger of snakes, ironic hey?? They obviously disturbed this one and he found shelter by squeezing sideways into the air hole at the bottom of the wall. These holes are thin and small and unless we had observed it ourselves, we would never have believed that a 1.3 metre snake could possibly manage to get through.
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| He had to go sideways to fit in! |
Fortunately the space is between the layers of bricks and not a passage into the actual house, but the middle daughter is a little wary of going to use the toilet, even though we have all reassured her that it cannot come up through the pipes. Marna came to ask us to keep an eye out for it and to observe it's movements and it's timing, as she was going to find a snake handler to come and remove it. One of the best men for the job is a teacher at the High School in Vredenburg, so she sent her mobile phone along with the middle daughter to show him the photo and to have it correctly identified. Even though we knew it was a boomslang, there was always a slight hope that we had made a mistake and it would turn out to be a harmless grass snake! No such luck!
Although the boomslang is a back-fanged snake, it can open it's mouth 170 degrees. The highly potent venom disables the blood clotting process, so victims die from internal and external bleeding. The venom is slow to act however,and the symptoms take a few hours to manifest themselves, so there is time to seek help, but because there is no immediate pain, the victim may not realise the seriousness of the situation, until too late. A complete blood transfusion may be the only chance of survival.
Diaurnal, reclusive and shy, they will flee from anything that is too large to eat. (I hope they know that!) They eat chameleons, mice, birds and eggs, which they swallow whole. They hibernate in cool weather, often in weaver nests that are closed and warm.
We haven't seen the snake for a few days now, he may have moved on, hopefully further than the trees in our garden!
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