Hervey Bay snake catchers: panicked woman vacuums yellow-faced whip snake
Shocked woman discovered snake while vacuuming her house – and what she did next left reptile expert dumbfounded
- Panicked woman vacuumed a hose
- Animal was alive and released into the wild
A seasoned snake catcher was left stunned after responding to a call in which a panicked woman had sucked up a venomous snake.
Drew Godfrey, who runs Hervey Bay Snake Catchers in Queensland, received a call from a couple at a nearby holiday resort on Tuesday.
“Just when you think you’ve seen it all in this job, someone calls you and says his wife sucked up a hose with the vacuum cleaner!” he wrote on Facebook.
Drew Godfrey, who runs Hervey Bay Snake Catchers in Queensland, examines the vacuum bag to find the snake
The snake catcher uploaded a video of him rescuing the snake from the vacuum.
“This is a little different,” he says, carefully checking the vacuum hose before removing and tearing open the bag.
“It’s a yellow-faced whip snake.”
“Poor little man, I bet that sucked for you. I’m just glad it’s okay – I was afraid we’d run into a dead snake.’
He adds, “I was tempted to pick him up and hold him, but he might bite, especially after that ordeal.”
Mr. Godfrey then placed the snake in a plastic box labeled “Danger: Poisonous Snakes” before releasing it into the wild.
The snake was a newborn yellow-faced whip snake, a slender, fast-moving species found throughout Australia.
The species, which is often confused with the extremely venous eastern brown snake, can grow to about a meter in length.
Yellow-faced whip snakes are venomous, but not considered harmful to humans. Mr Godfrey described their bite as ‘a bee sting’
They are poisonous, but not considered particularly harmful to humans.
“I was poisoned three times by these snakes,” Godfrey recalled News Week. “It’s like a bee sting.”
Godfrey told the couple that the snake is a protected species and that it would be “cruel and illegal” to leave it there.