A deadly snake has been left left in a box on the driveway of a police officer's house on the far south coast of New South Wales.
The off-duty officer found the death adder on his back lawn, and a box with derogatory words written on it was discovered on the driveway soon afterwards. A forensic examination confirmed the snake had been in the box.
That cop had kids - so very wrong. Death adders are really, really dangerous. (Although I'm guessing maybe the name gave that away.)
Took this photo in 2006. East of Canberra got out of the car for some reason or other, saw this little guy not far from the road digging a little hole. I don't know what type of lizard he is. I'll try and find out.
I hate and love zoos. Some I just hate, I guess. But many are very good at what zoos are supposed to be good at: fascinating humans while educating them about animals while being exceptionally mindful of the care of those animals. On that note, Christine and I went for a drive up north yesterday and came across the Australia Reptile Park. We were tired of driving and said What the hell and paid the $24 (!) to get in.
We will be going back. Possibly to work as volunteers.
First, a sign we saw in the park, helpfully illustrating the life cycle of the tasmanian devil (click to enlarge):
In case you didn't get that, kids:
Look at those faces: Mating is fun! And a little naughty! Like I said: educating and fascinating!
Moving on: The Australia Reptile Park is one of the country's most important wildlife parks/zoos. For starters: It's where the venom from what is commonly called the most deadly spider in the world, the Sydney funnel web spider, is "milked" from spiders in order to develop antivenom. (Here's how they do it!) That antivenom first became available in 1980: before that, deaths from funnel web bites weren't exactly common, but they did happen, and if you didn't die you suffered horribly and were in the hospital for weeks. Since development of the antivenom there has not been a single reported death from the bite of a Sydeny funnel web. Not one. You still suffer horribly—the funnel web's bite is extremely painful, and you'll still get fever and sweats and chills and nausea and pain and pain and pain—but you're only in the hospital for a couple days, rather than weeks and weeks.
Note: When Christine was a kid her grandfather died from a funnel web bite. She has a funny story about that. Honestly. Seems Grandpa was able to kill the spider—always helpful—and dear little Christine, about six at the time, was assigned the duty of holding said dead spider while they raced to the hospital. Once there, they were tending to grandpa and whatnot…when the "dead" funnel web spider…the most deadly spider in creation…started crawling across Christine's hand. But really, she should tell you the story…
The park, we found out from the very nice and very funny Ranger Mike, has about 600 venomous snakes - OH. MY. GOD. I am so going into the building - and they do regular venom milking on several of them of different species, as well as the venomous spider milking. They even have king cobras—the only zoo in Australia that has these snakes. And they breed them. And if we volunteer…maybe we can help milk them? Please?
Let's get to some pics. You'll be happy to hear that I actually didn't take very many. First, on the drive out, we stopped and listed to some bell birds. Just beautiful. (The also beautiful whining cries are from another type of bird which I'm not familiar with. I will let you know when I find out.)
I've always thought of copperheads as distinctly American snakes, but they are found in many parts of the world. Here's an Aussie version—very venomous (of course)—the very attractive lowland copperhead:
Here's a closer shot. If you click, then click again, you can get in very close to the cute bugger's face, and see the mites on its head. Mites are a big problem with captive (and wild) snakes.
Next up, a non-native animal, the Galapagos tortoise. I don't have much to say about it, but this beast does have an odd shell:
Now back to native Oz: wombats, the cutest little pig creatures you ever saw. I'll write more about them when we see them in the wild, which we will:
• My feelings about animals in captivity were very affected by this book: King Solomon's Ring. Lorenz believed that some, maybe many, animals are not adversely affected by captivity. And he speaks with more than a little authority. (On a personal note, I think it was my old friend Dave May who recommended that book to me. Along with A Confederacy of Dunces,A Canticle For Liebowitz, and many more. Thanks for that, Dave.)
I spent several hours yesterday walking in Ku-ring-gai Chase National Park just north of Sydney. (The name is actually redundant: a chase is "a tract of unenclosed land used as a game preserve." The founders of the chase didn't want to call it a park, as that, in their 1890s view of things, suggested a fenced in area.) It was hot, in the 90s, dry, I didn't have enough water, and my hip started hurting before I got out of bed. I went off-trail at one point in chase of a brown furry animal the size of a small dog, through thick bush in an area home to death adders and brown snakes, both of which can kill you quickly. It was all around glorious, and I found some spectacular spots in a park I will be walking regularly.
As soon as I got off the bus I saw a strange little bird, a youngun, intent on digging a little pit, and completely unafraid of me. I don't know what it is, perhaps a young bush turkey:
I saw a fat goanna, at least three feet long—look how long that tail is—which made the heat and the hurt totally worthwhile:
Here's a good head shot:
And one of my famously shaky videos, at the end of which you can see a bit of the goanna shuffle:
After stumbling down the hill to try and get a shot of the mysterious creature, a reddish, chocolate brown thing with thick fur, I came upon McCarrs Creek, where I caught a tiny crab:
Back on McCarrs Creek road I waited for a bus, and saw a dead animal. I think it was a swampwallaby. You can see the long feet, and tail, and the little arms:
Poor critter. That's probably what I saw in the bush. Hopefully next time I'll have a good photo of a live one.
