At first glance, it’s a cute photo of siblings walking hand-in-hand down a bush track in Victoria’s northeast. But on closer inspection, there’s a hard-to-spot danger lying in their path.
The kids were walking on the dirt road in Eskdale when their mum snapped a photo of their adventures. It wasn’t until the following day that she looked at the images and noticed a large eastern brown snake on the road, just centimetres from her son’s foot.
“She looked at the photos and then realised that the kids were right next to a snake,” Snake Catcher Victoria Barry Goldsmith told Yahoo News.
The mum also walked right past the snake herself without realising.
While the photo was taken back in 2019, and published worldwide, Barry reshared the images to his Facebook page this week. He said the photos served as a reminder for people to act sensibly and remain alert while out in nature.
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“Generally speaking, they’ll move off when they see you coming, but this one obviously wasn’t too worried about it,” he said.
Barry said it is important for people to remain calm and respect our native wildlife.
“Snakes don’t attack people, no one has ever been attacked by a snake. The snake’s always defending itself.
“They’re not really aggressive animals. All they’ve got is an instinct to fight or flight, so they don’t want to have anything to do with us.
“They’re certainly not going to lie on the grass and wait for us to walk past and then jump out and bite us for no reason,” he said.
Barry gave a tick of approval to the kids’ outfits, saying long pants are an extra bit of protection when hiking in bushland.
“Ideally, the proper footwear and long pants is a good idea. And educating the kids to look around,” he said.
What to do if you see a snake this summer
As many of us head outdoors to enjoy the warmer weather, it’s likely there’ll be snakes about.
If you’re lucky enough to see one, Barry said to give it a wide berth of two to three metres or just wait until it moves along.
“If you’re walking in the bush, you’re probably expecting to see some animals anyway. They can’t all be cute and fluffy!” he said.
Venom from an eastern brown is potent and causes progressive paralysis and uncontrollable bleeding.
Eastern browns have caused more deaths from snake bite than any other species in Australia, according to the Australian Museum.
The museum notes that many of the deaths were a “direct result” of people trying to kill the snakes and could’ve easily been avoided.
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