Call in professionals, don’t harm snakes
The call for restraint follows an incident in Durban where a black mamba was burned with boiling water and jeyes liquid all in an effort to kill the deadly snake.
BLACK mambas and other snakes on the move is not a cause for panic or for people to harm snakes. That’s according to Sunningdale snake man, Jason Arnold. The call for restraint follows an incident in Durban where a black mamba was burned with boiling water and Jeyes Fluid all in an effort to kill the deadly snake.
When the method didn’t work, professional assistance in the form of Arnold was called in.
Arnold added this was not the only incident he had come across where residents around KwaZulu-Natal tried to harm or maim the snake in order to get rid of the reptile.
“What people fail to understand, and I see it all too often, is that when a snake is put in a position where it is desperately trying to get away, but keeps being interfered with by people trying to kill or catch it, this is when the snake is likely to decide that biting the aggressor is the only option it has to survive,” he said.
Read also: WATCH: Arnold warns residents of dangerous stiletto snake
Referring to the latest incident, Arnold said when people have also caused the snake injury or pain, the chances of it actually wanting to bite someone is heavily increased.
“A bite from a snake after this amount of interference and trauma and you can be sure it is going to inject as much venom as it can into you when it does bite, and it may even bite you more than once, decreasing your chances of surviving the bite in the case of a neurotoxic envenomation, or having much more severe tissue damage in cases where cytotoxic venoms are involved,” he said.
The 37-year-old urged residents to respect snakes and not harm them.
The injured mamba was recently released after Arnold nursed it back to health by keeping the burn wounds from being infected.
Read also: WATCH: Large black mamba found in woman’s bed
“This is not about belittling or causing offence to the people involved in this particular case, but rather to educate people of the dangers of interfering with wild animals. Us professionals are here for a reason. Make use of us,” he concluded.
Contact Arnold on 082 745 6375.
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