
My kids were enjoying a school holiday movie when they saw something staring at them from the other side of the glass.
It was a big tiger snake moving along the brickwork.
It was either very curious or staring at its own reflection in the windows.
I went out to move it along. It was not happy to see me, doing the cobra thing with its neck.
We rarely see tiger snakes, but when we do its not around the dams, as you might expect, but at the house.
A few years ago we had a small one banging its nose against the back door.
We had a bigger one lying next to the bins, which my wife discovered as she took out a rubbish bag.
We forget they are around and get lazy watching our step.
Suffice to say, the recent visitor made us wary again, especially in warm weather.
We hear secondhand stories about horses, dogs and cattle getting bitten in farmer’s paddocks, but it’s not happened here, as far as I know, and we have many pets and other animals roaming around.
As a former Adelaide resident, I found SA’s eastern brown snakes more concerning, as they were common, very fast, and actively hunted in daylight.
The tiger snakes here seem to just mooch around, until disturbed.
Out in the forests, around the button grass and rivers, they are abundant. We often see them while walking.
They move quickly at times and one raced out onto a bush track in front of us, presumably while hunting.
We also see them on roads.
Tassie has two other snake varieties, but I’ve never seen a copperhead or whip snake in the Huon.