DAVID Schwennesen knew that 55 years ago there was a death adder spotted at his home property, Talgazlie, in south west Queensland by his mum.
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It wasn’t until this week when he was out checking sheep with Lloyd Dunlop that Mr Schwennesen saw his first death adder in the wild.
After first driving past the snake, thinking it was a dead blue tongue lizard, the pair doubled back.
“I said to Lloyd it looked like a death adder, I’ve never seen one but i knew what they looked like, and initially i thought it had been run over but it was very alive,” he said
“I poked it with a stick and it gave a really rapid strike, a random one to say ‘don’t come too close to me’… so I didn’t.”
As the snake left the road, Lloyd captured the amazing video of the creature.
Mr Schwennesen said the snake was “quite pretty”, and in his 48 years he had never seen one in the wild.
“It was a great thing to see, they are quite pretty,” he said.
“I like my snakes too, some people probably think it was something to run over but I don’t mind having them around.”
He said when the duo interrupted the snake, it was being carefully watched by a few crows who could have been the next meal.
“It’s tail was pretty distinct, the last probably couple of cm is a different colour, you can see how it really would attract a bird,” Mr Schwennesen said.
“It’s pale and it looks like something that would probably be wiggling around in the leaf litter for birds to attract.
“It didn’t want to have anything to do with us, just flattened itself out to not be seen, then when it was seen it struck out in response then it moved out.
“It looked like a really healthy one.”
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