Brown snake!!! :-)
 

14 years in Australia and my first bona fide sighting of a lethal animal (valid assumption?) in the 'wild':

http://i49.photobucket.com/albums/f2...1004-00038.jpg

I wasn't willing to get any closer for the photo opportunity but he was about 6-8ft long, as thick as your wrist and happily wriggling away across the road, along the gutter and up onto the pavement.

There were 2 middle aged women trying to encourage me to run over it in the car with the whole "only good snake is a dead snake" mantra - but I'm not so keen to destroy an interesting and easily avoided bit of fauna.

Re: Brown snake!!! :-)
 

Chances are the thing would have got wrapped up in your suspension

Re: Brown snake!!! :-)
 

Nice snake:

Re: Brown snake!!! :-)
 

Don't ever run them over, not unless you fancy giving it a free ride home ;)

Re: Brown snake!!! :-)
 

Where was that? We've had some around the office in Banyo.. :eek:

Re: Brown snake!!! :-)
 

Murarrie (lots of nearby swampland with suitable birds, amphibians and rodents to feed on)

Re: Brown snake!!! :-)
 

I doubt it was anywhere near 8 feet but a nice looking snake. I have been called out in the past to catch a huge deadly snake at least 10 feet long to find a Carpet Python about 3 feet long at best. Rather than advise others not to run over a snake because it might get tangled up in the car its possibly best to discourage it because it is illegal to deliberately hurt a protected animal. Im amazed this was the first venomous snake you have seen in all those years, quite an achievement :)

Re: Brown snake!!! :-)
 

It was still in the same spot when I left work 4 hours later - and although I didn't straighten it out to measure it I'm standing by the original estimate made when it was tracking down the curb and reasonably stretched out. Definately in excess of 6ft so 6-8ft seems a reasonable category to place it in

Re: Brown snake!!! :-)
 

That's fair enough it is just that an 8 foot snake really is huge.

Re: Brown snake!!! :-)
 

Agreed - its a big MOFO, perhaps we can settle on "6ft+" as a description?

Reviewing that picture it does seem relatively fat and short compared to the pythons Ive had around the yard a few times (accurately measured via discarded skins @8ft) so perhaps I'm projecting unreasonably for this brown beastie based on its impressive girth?

Either way I'm spectacularly impressed that he was still there at the end of the day. I hope he hadn't been run over and was just lying there dying? (he still appeared to be in tact. - but I didn't get too close)

I'll check again tomorrow morning!

Re: Brown snake!!! :-)
 

Are you sure it isn't dead already? The only still snakes I've seen have been dead.

Re: Brown snake!!! :-)
 

Ok... so you question the validity of an 8 foot snake but you say you were called out to deal with a ten foot one.I think your just a black cat merchant.

Re: Brown snake!!! :-)
 

It was pretty clear from the post that "huge deadly snake 10 feet long" was what the caller said, and that it in fact turned out to be smaller.

Re: Brown snake!!! :-)
 

Well I checked snake about 2 metres from my wife when she was sitting under tree by the river. It was also brown on top with a green side/belly. About 40cm long and very thick for its body length, about 4cm in diameter. The tail tapered off quickly. It slinked off into the undergrowth before I could get a photo.

Can't ID it from this website.

http://www.wildlifeqld.com.au/Snake_Identification_and_Infomation.html

Anyway, first wild live snake siting in Oz.

Re: Brown snake!!! :-)
 

No I'm not sure but it did move to have its head hanging off the gutter by the time I left. it definitely seemed healthy when I first saw it. I pulled up short of running over it in the car as it was coiled on the road, then as I parked up it uncoiled, headed to the gutter and moved 10m or so down the road before jumping up the gutter, gagging about on the grass a bit and the settling down.

4 hours later he was on the same stretch of grass.

dead? Perhaps, I don't whether he was already injured by the time I saw him.

For the record I've seen a few perfectly still snakes before; basking, sorting themselves out....