r/SnakeRescue Dec 05 '19

Articles How to stay safe during snake season

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Hey guys, as some of you may have seen, I'm a snake catcher and snake photographer. Since snakes are more active during the warmer months, I thought I'd share some safety information for those interested.

Please feel free to copy & forward this information to your friends, family, colleagues, and local neighborhood groups.

Now that the warmer weather has arrived in South Africa, the chances of encountering a snake are higher, and snake catchers have already seen an increase in callouts around the country.

It's important to know what to do and not to do if you should encounter a snake:

- Firstly, know that snakes don't chase people or try to bite people unprovoked. If you leave them alone, most of the time they will just try to get away and hide. However, if you try to capture, hurt, or kill them, they may try to defend themselves by biting.

- If you see a snake, keep watching it while you call a snake catcher. Stay 5 meters away from the snake, at that distance even a spitting snake can't reach you in any way. It's very important that you keep your eyes on the snake until the snake catcher arrives, because once they've hidden somewhere they're often impossible to find again.

- If a person or pet has been bitten by a snake, don't try cutting the patient, sucking out venom, applying shocks, applying tourniquets (restricting blood flow), or any other "home remedies". The only thing that will help with a bite from a dangerously venomous snake, is medical assistance at a hospital. You can use a Smart Pressure Bandage to restrict lymphatic flow and the spread of venom for neurotoxic bites only, but this would require you to be able to identify the species of snake. Best is generally to just get to the nearest hospital with a trauma unit as quickly as you can.

- If a snakebite has occurred, you don't need to identify the snake or take the snake with you to hospital. Take a photo of the snake if you can, but otherwise just try and get the patient to medical assistance as quickly as possible. The doctors will treat the patient symptomatically, and since we only have two snake antivenoms in South Africa (Monovalent for Boomslang bites, Polyvalent for Cape Cobras, Black Mambas, Puff Adders, Mozambique Spitting Cobras, and a bunch of other snakes), they'll know which type to use (if necessary) based on the symptoms.

- Antivenom is not something you can carry with you, or use at home. It needs to be kept cool, it has a fairly short shelf life, for something like a Cape Cobra bite you'd start with 10 vials, needs to be administered intravenously, and a lot of people are allergic to antivenom. It should only ever be administered in a hospital context, and in more than 80% of snakebite cases no antivenom is used.

The free "ASI Snakes" app provides a list of contact details for snake catchers country-wide, as well as lots of information about snakes in Southern Africa, snakebite first aid, and a feature where you can submit a photo of a snake to have it identified - you can get it for free at www.snakebiteapp.co.za.

If you have any questions about South African snakes, feel free to ask me in the comments below!

EDIT 2020-01-10 15:00: Added details about Smart Pressure Bandages and what not to do.


r/SnakeRescue 2d ago

Cobra-Catching in Easy Mode!

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Bangalore, India. Who's gonna complain about an easy snake call? Not me.


r/SnakeRescue 3d ago

Chonky Viper in a Tarp

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Bangalore, India. We had to remove this large Russell's Viper which had curled up within the plastic liner for an under-construction pond. I was just the assist this time around.


r/SnakeRescue 3d ago

A Young Cobra With a Full Belly

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Bangalore, India. This sub-adult had to be removed from a construction plot. Had clearly recently gorged itself on something yummy, so I tried to make sure the catch was as quick and efficient as I could manage with minimal handling time


r/SnakeRescue 5d ago

Saving a Viper from Certain Death

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I'll never know how this snake managed to get itself into this mess, but I'm glad we could give it another shot at life!


r/SnakeRescue 5d ago

Russell’s Viper gave us the runaround

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This one took us over 30 minutes to extract and most of that time we couldn’t even see the snake. Not my favourite scenario. Bangalore, India (Nov 2025)


r/SnakeRescue 17d ago

Please help this snake!

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My wife was loving a rock in our backyard and found this cute little ring neck snake. Unfortunately she is scared of snakes so when she saw it she jumped back and dropped the rock back onto the snake. This caused an injury and I feel so terrible. I've had pet snakes in the past and love them.

I captured it safely and carefully cleaned the dirt from the wound with water. It's resting now in a clean bucket with some clean cloth towels for cover.

My question is, what should I do to help it? I have an old snake enclosure I can set him up in until he's healed but idk if I should just leave the wound alone completely or give him a bath with something in it? Use some sort of snake safe ointment? I'm not going to treat it like a human obviously but I want him to survive this! ❤️

The wound is scraped free of scales and I can see the muscle underneath. There looks to be some flesh sticking out which is concerning. It does move around just fine and didn't really flinch when I get near it. Please help!


r/SnakeRescue Aug 03 '26

trying to save an adder

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we have a small european adder in our backyard. my dad and our neighbor are wanting to kill it, despite this snake multiple times fleeing whenever approached.

is there anything i could do to save it? it's currently chilling underneath our shed, coming out sometimes to warm up in front of the shed, on the rocks. it is quite small, i think it might be young

update: i caught it and am currently relocating it


r/SnakeRescue Jul 23 '26

How can I safely rescue or move the snake?

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Yesterday I found one snake in my backyard near a water pump. I couldn’t get a clear look so can’t ID. It went inside the water well real quick. I want to safely relocate it somewhere safe or out of my property as I a kid in a house. How can I do that without harming the snake?

Any safe trap trick so that I don’t have to touch it or something.

Thanks in advance !


r/SnakeRescue Jul 18 '26

Stacking vivariums?

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r/SnakeRescue Jul 17 '26

What the hell...

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This was seriously recommended to me by YouTube. Recently there is way too much content celebrating the abuse and killing of snakes. Just saw some people happy that a father killed a snake. What a terrible world to live in.


r/SnakeRescue Jul 17 '26

Snake Found In My Office Premise, can anyone identify if it’s venomous or harmless?

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r/SnakeRescue Jul 10 '26

Red Morph Western Plains Garter Snake video

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r/SnakeRescue Jul 09 '26

Meta Looking for testers for my outdoors & photography related app (with a science / history edge)

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Hey everyone

Ephemeros is an app that allows users to capture recurring photos of landscapes and landmarks over time, building up a scientific and historical record of how natural growth, architecture, etc. changes over time.

If you'd like to get test access, please join this Google Group:

https://groups.google.com/g/ephemeros-app-testers

Then sign up as a tester on the web:

https://play.google.com/apps/testing/app.ephemeros.mobile

Then get the app on the Play Store:

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=app.ephemeros.mobile


r/SnakeRescue Jul 01 '26

I scared my mechanic a bit :D

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Thought you guys might like this for a laugh. Australian Carpet Python: Morelia spilota.

This little guy was hiding under the hood.

Thankfully a guy I went to school with Rob Watson has done snake catching in Brisbane Qld, for 20+ years was just a few blocks away.


r/SnakeRescue Jun 30 '26

What is happening to this snake? Is it on the verge of passing away?

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Black Racer, FL - Hey Reddit, we saw this snake in our yard and it was severely tensing up. Some clear fluid came from the mouth. Eventually the snake relaxed and seemed normal so we placed it back in the yard thinking it was a defensive strategy. The snake slithered away like a normal snake. We came walking back around minutes later to it its head completely flipped upside down and its head was firmly planted into the ground and it seemed as if it was dying and became limp. What could be wrong?

Edit: All the muscle tensing and crinkling has passed. The snake took some time for rest and we monitored to see if any other signs of strange movement or lethargy. Hasn’t showed signs of twisting since and is moving around alright. Seems a little exhausted after the episode but doing okay!


r/SnakeRescue Jun 24 '26

Neglected snakes in need of rescue Nj/NY/PA (found on fb marketplace)

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These are NOT my snakes, I just saw these posts on Facebook marketplace and knew I had to try to get these guys a better home. I would take them in if I had space and wasn’t a college student. The last one in particular is in really rough shape. Please dm me if you think you can take them in so I can refer their page to you, I’m not sure if I’m allowed to post their users on this.


r/SnakeRescue Jun 15 '26

HELP - what to do?

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r/SnakeRescue Jun 05 '26

What is this snake. Is it rattle snake or viper[Kerala, India]

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r/SnakeRescue May 15 '26

#snake #playing #adventure

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Catch and release


r/SnakeRescue May 06 '26

Snake in shed

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r/SnakeRescue Apr 26 '26

I couldn’t save this guy - 😞[Asia - India] dead snake NSFW

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r/SnakeRescue Apr 21 '26

Look What I Found In Tucson

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r/SnakeRescue Apr 03 '26

Injured snake

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I accidentally hit this little one doing yard work. I have no experience with snakes and it’s still moving a lot but I’m not sure if that means it can recover from this. I’m in Baltimore MD and I have tried to contact some wildlife rehabilitation centers but haven’t been very successful. does this look like something it can recover from? looking for suggestions on what the humane thing to do would be. thanks


r/SnakeRescue Feb 12 '26

Anyone know what this little fella is? Found in Broome, northern WA

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