We’ve been spending the last few weeks preparing for summer. Yes, every year as the weather warms up there are certain precautions that may not ‘need’ doing, but it’s a good idea if you do. So far we’ve had…
Today we will be looking at snakes.
Snake in the loft
Some of you might be aware that three years or so ago a snake came into my house. I videoed the whole thing and put it on my post called What Happens When a Snake Enters Your House?
Well, last week we had another snake incident in my home, this time I wasn’t so fast with the video recorder, so this is a ‘reconstruction’ of real events that took place during the afternoon of Thursday, 16 October here in the Bobinoz house.
Only the names have been changed to protect the innocent.
A couple of guys, Jim and Joe, had come round to work on my air-conditioning system; they needed to make a few adjustments. This meant that Joe had to go into the loft to change the resident gizmo attached to the flanged stipler.
Or something like that.
So, step ladder in place, loft door open…
…our man Joe climbs the steps and pokes his head into the loft with a torch strapped to his forehead and clutching the replacement gizmo.
His rapid descent from the steps back to the floor was about seven times faster than his ascent, and when he hit the ground, slightly dishevelled, he said…
“There’s a snake in the loft!”
He then added “I stuck my head in and it was right there, just inches from my face, reared up in the strike position, I’m surprised it didn’t bite me.”
You all know the strike position, don’t you?
On further questioning, no he didn’t know what kind of snake it was, the light was shining at its underbelly which appeared white in colour. But that may just have been down to the torchlight. The snake then disappeared quite quickly, as they do.
This incident certainly did cause a quite significant delay, quite understandably he was reluctant to go back in. In fairness though, Joe was quite accustomed to snakes, he used to keep carpet pythons as pets and he wasn’t going to let a snake stop him from doing his work.
He asked for a stick, not to harm the snake, but just to have a rummage around to make sure he wasn’t hiding under any of the loft insulation.
Back he went up the ladder to poke around, Jim behind him holding a second torch to offer additional cover, a bit like they do in the movies. I went outside to keep an eye on the eaves and the roof, in case I could see the snake slither away through the same hole he would have used to enter the loft in the first place.
Nothing. None of us saw nothing. The snake had disappeared.
Bravely, Joe went back in to the loft and switched over the gizmos. Job done! No emergency treatment needed. No ambulance required.
With the closing of the loft hatch door, we could all relax again.
I checked with Jim and Joe that there was no way the snake could wriggle itself into the ducting and therefore drop-down through one of the grills into my house, and they assured me it couldn’t.
So I decided to leave the snake in my loft, no need for a snake catcher, he will leave the same way that he came when he gets bored. At least he will deter any rats who might have been thinking of occupying the same space.
Gizmo 2
Unfortunately, as work progressed, Jim and Joe realised that it would be a good idea to fit a second and unrelated gizmo into the loft to improve the system further.
Oh dear, poor old Joe. He put his ladder up again, slowly inched his way towards the hatch and then carefully began to lift the wooden doorway to one side. But something was in the way, there was some kind of resistance, as if something was on top of the hatch door.
Was our snake now curled up and resting immediately above us? Then we all heard the sound…
“Meow!”
Oh my word, not only do we have a snake up in the loft, we have a cat as well…
Hold on a minute, white underbelly snake?
Remy, for those who don’t know, is one of two cats we have here. He is slightly psychopathic and very inquisitive, I would imagine the steps leading to the loft, a place he would have been very curious to see, were just too tempting for him. And it would seem at some point after the ladder had been put in place, Remy went in. Joe must have stuck his head in and mistaken Remy’s tail for a snake in strike position. Easily done.
Can you tell the difference?
A cat
A snake
Tricky, isn’t it? Well, it gave us all a good laugh.
Remy, what are you like?
A snake, apparently.
Sounds a really scary place to live. Thank God I can walk around knowing theres no chance of a snake here in Yorkshire. You have my condolences. Keep safe and get your local government officials to use there heads and get the snakes sorted, are they more important than people, I would say NEVER
Oh my word no, it’s not a scary place to live at all. I can think of many many places far scarier than Australia, I would say Australia is one of the safest countries in the world.
There really isn’t a snake problem for the council to fix, snakes live here, they are part of our ecosystem, it’s no big problem. More people each year, in both of our countries, are killed in a dog attack than are killed by snakes in this country.
BOB, I almost spit my drink from laughing Hahahhahaha, specially imagining this dude running down the stairs and saying there is a snake in the loft 😀
By the way, a quick question, if I found a snake in my home, is killing it illegal or something?
You should have been where I was, it was pretty funny here as well 🙂
In Australia, yes, it is illegal to kill a snake, is also very dangerous to attempt to do so but above all, totally unnecessary. If a snake is in your house, best advice is to isolated in a room, put towels or something along the gaps under the doors so it can’t get out or if the room has a door to outside, leave that door open and seal everything else.
The snake will hopefully go out of that door and disappear outside, or if it won’t or it’s a room without an exit, call the snake catcher. Paying $100 or so is a lot better than losing your life.
Cheers, Bob