beatlloydy
Well-Known Member
Hi all,
Over the weekend a group of 8 including myself attended a Venomous Snakehandling course run by Sean from Snakehandler.Participants ranged from complete novices like myself to post a grad research student as well as those from pest control and mining industries.
The course was well run and divided over 2 days. The first day covering all the theory including the OH&S side, Safety and equipment to site assessment etc. This was necessary to help us on the 2nd day when we would be handling live snakes.
On the 2nd day there was a short theory exam, followed by some ID of different sloughed skins using a Dichotomous reference code field guide (very interesting)...Then it was into the reptiles, the part that everyone had come for.
Sean (owner of Snakehandler) worked on an escalating level of (potential threat of) species to make us feel comfortable with the reptiles. This was done all 1 on 1 with Sean and his assistant (Em?) assessing and critiquing us, offering advice as well as encouragement.
I was probably the most nervous of the lot and to be honest this showed a little in my technique...need to not think so much but get into the zen of things.
Anyway, we first started with a Gippsland Water dragon, followed by a Mertons. Any bite by any of the reps was considered a fail so we were all quite nervous at first.
Onto the snakes as Sean started with A Darwin, followed by a coastal/jungle cross someone had surrendered to him as they could not look after it...apparently this can be a little nasty at times so was a good one to use for demonstration.
The progressive scale of snakes designed to get us used to handling some of the more venomous elapids went as follows
Water Python, Brown Tree Snake, Death Adder, Lowlands Copperhead, Blue Belly Black Snake, Red Belly Black Snake, Female Tiger Snake (small but fiesty), Male Tiger Snake (a little larger), Collets (my personal favourite), King Brown and finally a Mulga (a beautiful specimen...actually all Seans snakes are beautiful but I like the Collets and Mulga the best).
Sean also demonstrated on a fiesty Eastern Brown but deemed this one a little too aggressive for us newbies.
Techniques taught were pinning (on rubber only due to possible risk..not recommended by Sean to be done on live reps unless necessary due to stress on snake and also personal risk), Tonging, hooking and tailing. It was up to us to work out the correct method we were comfortable with given the size, disposition and situation of the snake we were dealing with. Generally for the smaller ones hooking was used and tailing for the larger snakes.
I thought the day was the most informative course of any description I had ever been on. I don't know whether or not I will use this information on a commercial basis but purely for working with such a variety of snakes in a safe environment it was well worth it. Sean's course is apparently the only Nationally accedited training course in Australia and the amount of detail he goes into shows why it is used by many companies in pest and mining industries etc to train their employees.
If you are over 18 and want to increase your reptile skills I would highly recommend it. This course gives the successful candidate the ability to apply for a snake removal licence. As I previously stated, even if I dont use the qualifications on a commercial basis, I have improved my overall confidence with snakes/reptiles in general. After handling the elapids etc my pythons will seem like pussycats.
This course (or other recognised courses) are really the only LEGAL way one can improve their knowledge of the handling of reptiles. For this reason alone I thought it was great value for money.
The only disappointing part of the entire day were the poor photos I took. The camera had been used underwater last time and small spots on the lens made focussing etc poor. However, as they say, if there aint no photos it didnt happen, so here are a few.
Over the weekend a group of 8 including myself attended a Venomous Snakehandling course run by Sean from Snakehandler.Participants ranged from complete novices like myself to post a grad research student as well as those from pest control and mining industries.
The course was well run and divided over 2 days. The first day covering all the theory including the OH&S side, Safety and equipment to site assessment etc. This was necessary to help us on the 2nd day when we would be handling live snakes.
On the 2nd day there was a short theory exam, followed by some ID of different sloughed skins using a Dichotomous reference code field guide (very interesting)...Then it was into the reptiles, the part that everyone had come for.
Sean (owner of Snakehandler) worked on an escalating level of (potential threat of) species to make us feel comfortable with the reptiles. This was done all 1 on 1 with Sean and his assistant (Em?) assessing and critiquing us, offering advice as well as encouragement.
I was probably the most nervous of the lot and to be honest this showed a little in my technique...need to not think so much but get into the zen of things.
Anyway, we first started with a Gippsland Water dragon, followed by a Mertons. Any bite by any of the reps was considered a fail so we were all quite nervous at first.
Onto the snakes as Sean started with A Darwin, followed by a coastal/jungle cross someone had surrendered to him as they could not look after it...apparently this can be a little nasty at times so was a good one to use for demonstration.
The progressive scale of snakes designed to get us used to handling some of the more venomous elapids went as follows
Water Python, Brown Tree Snake, Death Adder, Lowlands Copperhead, Blue Belly Black Snake, Red Belly Black Snake, Female Tiger Snake (small but fiesty), Male Tiger Snake (a little larger), Collets (my personal favourite), King Brown and finally a Mulga (a beautiful specimen...actually all Seans snakes are beautiful but I like the Collets and Mulga the best).
Sean also demonstrated on a fiesty Eastern Brown but deemed this one a little too aggressive for us newbies.
Techniques taught were pinning (on rubber only due to possible risk..not recommended by Sean to be done on live reps unless necessary due to stress on snake and also personal risk), Tonging, hooking and tailing. It was up to us to work out the correct method we were comfortable with given the size, disposition and situation of the snake we were dealing with. Generally for the smaller ones hooking was used and tailing for the larger snakes.
I thought the day was the most informative course of any description I had ever been on. I don't know whether or not I will use this information on a commercial basis but purely for working with such a variety of snakes in a safe environment it was well worth it. Sean's course is apparently the only Nationally accedited training course in Australia and the amount of detail he goes into shows why it is used by many companies in pest and mining industries etc to train their employees.
If you are over 18 and want to increase your reptile skills I would highly recommend it. This course gives the successful candidate the ability to apply for a snake removal licence. As I previously stated, even if I dont use the qualifications on a commercial basis, I have improved my overall confidence with snakes/reptiles in general. After handling the elapids etc my pythons will seem like pussycats.
This course (or other recognised courses) are really the only LEGAL way one can improve their knowledge of the handling of reptiles. For this reason alone I thought it was great value for money.
The only disappointing part of the entire day were the poor photos I took. The camera had been used underwater last time and small spots on the lens made focussing etc poor. However, as they say, if there aint no photos it didnt happen, so here are a few.
