In February, perhaps the most hair-raising of them all, happened when I was sitting on the garden bench, enjoying the late afternoon sun. The bench was against the house wall n the patio and I was sat at one end of the bench.
Suddenly, out of the corner of my eye, a noticed movement at the other end of the bench. Glancing in that direction, I saw a snakes head appear between the bench seat and the arm rest. I'm afraid I forgot all instructions to stay still, jumping up and dashing to the other side of the patio as far away from the bench as possible. Of course, this sudden movement startled the olive brown snake, which was about the thickness of a plastic waste pipe and very long. It retreated across the garden to the rockery, and I watched it aghast slithering away over the grass, relief and annoyance washing over me: relief that it didn't attack me and annoyance that I wasn't able to take a photo of it!
However, recent visitations by snakes, to the house, have been photographed. The first is a young mamba, about 60cm in length and the thickness of cable wire. It came out of the top of one of the pillars holding up the verandah, whilst the brickwork was being varnished:
By the time I took this photo the poor thing had been hit by a guard's stick several times!
The next snake is a puff adder: the snake that kills cattle on the farm. They are very slow and lazy, so do not move out of the way when disturbed. Cattle step on them and get bitten. This one was near the drive, where there are rocks protruding out of the soil:
About a metre in length and about the thickness of a plastic waste pipe, again it was killed by Brian, our guard on duty:
Here it is being held by, very brave, Henry, showing its length as around 60cm:
I hope that is the last for a while, now that the painting and varnishing has finished.
No comments:
Post a Comment