A family in Queensland, Australia came home after a tiring day of sightseeing to discover a poisonous visitor sprawled out on their couch.
When the family entered the room, the eastern brown snake slithered underneath a recliner, where it remained until it was captured and relocated on Sunday night by snake catcher Ozzie (Glenn) Lawrence of OzCapture Snake Relocations.
“I couldn’t find it [at first],” Lawrence told Newsweek. “I had to search through the loungeroom. They knew it had gone underneath the couches, and I found it behind a leather flap at the back of the twin couch in the middle.”
The snake had wound itself around the fixings inside the mechanical recliner couch, concealed behind a Velcro leather covering. Holding the cover flap in one hand, Lawrence waited for the snake to turn around before grabbing it by the tail.
“All things considered it was actually quite calm and cool,” he said. “It wasn’t a very hot day, so his batteries weren’t full so to speak, so he wasn’t striking and biting.”
According to the Australian Museum, the snake was about 4.5 feet long, which is about average for an eastern brown snake.
The majority of snakebite fatalities in Australia are caused by eastern brown snakes, which are prevalent throughout eastern and southern Australia. They have venom that is ranked as the second-most toxic in the entire world. They often avoid interacting with people, are fiercely protective, and bite frequently if they sense a threat.
It is not unusual to find them in people’s homes because their natural habitat also coincides with some of Australia’s densest population centres.
“There are so many different ways that a snake can potentially get into your home,” Lawrence said. “It’s just their natural behavior and curiosity, looking for food.
“They can come out from behind air conditioning units; they can come out from underneath kitchen sinks; people have holes in their fly screens and windows left open; they can come in through doggy and cat doors.”
