AUSTRALIAN BROADCASTING CORPORATION 22 February 08 Respect the snake and live to tell the tale (Jodie van de Wetering)

Be careful around snakes - that's the simple safety message from Toogoom snake handler Roy McGrath.

Mr McGrath has a deep respect for the reptiles he handles. He said there are 28 different kinds of snakes he could encounter on his home patch, and none of them should be taken for granted.

"When I get a call to say there's a snake in a building, I usually ask the people to vacate the house, or if it's in a particular room to shut the snake in there and block up the cavity under the door. When I walk into a building I always treat that snake as venomous until I see it.

"My father was a good snake man," Mr McGrath recalled. "He was a native patrolman up in New Guinea for many years. We used to go catching snakes together, and I followed on the tradition."

Roy said the only bites he has sustained over the course of his life of catching snakes is the occasional 'tagging' from non-venomous species such as carpet pythons.

"The only time people get bitten is when they try to catch a snake themselves, kill it, stand on it, or try to touch it. Otherwise, all snakes will get out of your way. Except the old carpet snake, he's a pretty sleepy old fellow.

"To catch a snake I use a jigger, it's like a T-piece rubberised on the bottom. I pin the snake with that and then use metre-long snake tongs, which are snake friendly, they're rubberised. I get the snake with those, usually about 30cm back from the head, lift the snake up and into the snake bag, tie the bag off and take it away and release it.

"A snake must be released in an area which can sustain it. If you let a red bellied black snake go in hilly, undulating country where there's no water, that snake's not going to get the food it needs."

Mr McGrath said any snake bite should be treated as a potentially life threatening situation. He said it is important not to wash or wipe the bitten area, but to apply a compression bandage and get the patient straight to hospital.

"When a snake bites you, they'll always leave a certain amount of venom on the surface. Their fangs have a slit down the back, and when they pump the venom in, they'll always leave some on the skin. When you get to hospital they'll take that compression banadage off and take a saline swab, and they can identify the enzymes and proteins in that venom and then they know which antivenene to administer."

Mr McGrath also warned that it isn't easy to identify snakes. There are 28 different species found on Queensland's Fraser Coast, and they don't always look just like the pictures in the books.

"All snakes are quite variable in colour, eastern browns especially," Mr McGrath said. "The eastern browns that I catch around the Fraser Coast, I've seen them black, I've seen them cream, I've seen them copper like a new penny. Colouration is no guide to identifying a snake.

"All snakes shed their skin as they grow, and they can go very dark jut before they shed their skin. That skin also covers the eye, so for a couple of weeks before they shed, their eyesight's impaired."
Respect the snake and live to tell the tale

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