RECENTLY, I got a call about a young Mozambique spitting cobra which was moving around near someone’s back door. When I arrived, it had taken refuge in a drainpipe. I got the strong smell of Jeye’s Fluid as I approached – a common smell where snakes have been spotted. People think that it chases the snakes away.
Strangely, as I got close to the snake, it didn’t spray me with venom to defend itself. As I pulled it out of the pipe, my heart sank. It appeared to be dead. Then the tail moved ever so slightly. ‘Shame, its last few moments’, I thought. The owners had poured the toxic Jeye’s Fluid on the snake, which had just-about killed it. I put it in a tub, feeling down in the dumps, and headed home.
On my way home, I remembered hearing that if something like this happened, try using Sunlight dishwashing liquid (bizarre, I know). I phoned my friend Jason Arnold, and he explained how I could go about trying to revive the poor cobra.
I arrived home and quickly instructed my mother to get the Sunlight liquid and earbuds. We had to act fast if this snake was to survive. After opening the mouth, I could see the trachea opening and closing, but slowly. The snake was suffocating to death. The Jeye’s Fluid had blocked up its nostrils and it didn’t have the strength to open its mouth.
I safely secured the cobra behind the head, which obviously wasn’t difficult with a near-dead snake, but an accident could still happen. (Never attempt this at home, on any snake.) Dead or alive, if I let those fangs sink into me, I would have a major problem in my hands (literally).
While holding the cobra down, my mum, who is well-known in the Westville community as Mrs Evans (a teacher for 30-odd years), poured Sunlight liquid onto the snake for me. I then started rubbing the snake down with the slippery liquid from head to tail. It made things a lot more difficult as I was now holding the head of a slippery venomous serpent. I then used an earbud to rub Sunlight all over the snake’s head, especially around the mouth and on the nose.
Once the cobra had been soaked in Sunlight, my mum rinsed the soapy liquid off with water and then we repeated the process again, and again for a third time.
After that, I left it to see if it was able to breathe by itself. It was certainly a lot livelier after its Sunlight bath and its body was starting to wriggle about but the head was motionless. It still appeared to be struggling, so I pinned it down again. As I opened the mouth up with a toothpick, the snake took a huge gasp of air. You could see the relief. It was unable to breathe by itself, for now.
Feeling desperate, my ingenious mum had an idea. She handed me a spoon, but not just any spoon. If any of you have tried the Bokomo Chocolate Corn Flakes (a cereal probably aimed at children, but I love it), you would know it comes with a straw-like spoon, a ‘slurpy spoon’, which enables you to drink up the milk when you’ve finished your cereal.
I put the spoon end in the cobra’s mouth and the handle end in mine. I started blowing air gently into the snake. Basically I was trying to give it mouth-to-mouth. Worried it wasn’t working, I then used a straw to apply emergency snake CPR, desperate for this snake to pull through. It was breathing nicely after that, but once I had put it down again, it still didn’t have the energy to open his mouth and breathe freely, so I had to assist the cobra with breathing for over an hour. It was a long and somewhat tedious job which required a lot of concentration and persistence by both my mum and I. Eventually I put it down and gave it another chance. I thought I’d give it five minutes to try on its own. Well, five minutes later, I came back to find the little fighter moving up the side of the tub – it was breathing and moving by itself at last. Woohoo. What a miracle.
I could not believe the turn-around. I had almost given up on the snake and considered it a goner. Lifeless with no signs of coming back, who would have thought that a dishwashing liquid would bring it back from the dead? The liquid appeared to have combated the toxins of the Jeye’s Fluid. I was, and still am, speechless on the matter. I do not know how the Sunlight performed such a miracle, but it did.
We named the young cobra, a juvenile of around 35 centimetres long, Sunlight (of course). It is still in my care just to make sure it’s 100 per cent okay. So far so good, so it shall be returning back to the bush shortly.
Does Jeye’s Fluid keep snakes away?
No, it does not. If poured directly onto a snake, like in the case above, the toxic substance will kill the snake. But pouring it around your house, hoping that it keeps snakes away, doesn’t work. There is no deterrent that will keep snakes away, they come for food and shelter, so keep a neat and tidy garden.
