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The reptile will be released into the wild, where it will be safer.
Snake rescuer Nick Evans and community member Joseph rescue a python in KZN. Picture: Nick Evans/Facebook
Snake rescuer Nick Evans did not expect to see a large python when he was contacted by the municipality after a snake was spotted next to the M19 in New Germany, KwaZulu-Natal, last week.
Despite the municipality telling him it was a python, Evans said he went there expecting to find a Black Mamba, as “there are no pythons there”.
“There probably was a python population in the vicinity many, many decades ago, but they’ve since been wiped out. Although it would be a little unusual to be a mamba too, just more likely,” Evans said.
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Apart from the New Germany Nature Reserve, the area nearby is an industrial zone, with no suitable hiding place for a python of that size.
“On Thursday, I followed them to the spot where they had been seeing the big snake. When we arrived, I got out of my car, armed with my tongs, ready to catch the mamba. Then they pointed out the snake. ‘Bloody Hell!’- I was shocked, it was a python. I put my tongs back and walked into the bush, approaching the basking beast of a snake,” he added.
‘Easy catch’
What he initially thought would be an “easy catch” turned into a tug of war match when the reptile was not trying to attack him, but to get away.
“I had to catch this snake; it had no future here. I grabbed the tail, but as it peed in my hands (as always), it was starting to slip out of my grip. Up stepped [ a colleague] Joseph. He came to help me and grabbed the tail end, just as I was losing it. Together, we pulled, and pulled, and I could feel us ‘winning’ the tug of war. I let go and moved forward to go for the head, which I quickly got. The wrestling match was over.”
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The snake was around 3.5 metres.
Evans said the python would be released at an undisclosed location, where it will continue to exist in nature uninterrupted.
The Southern African python
According to the South African National Biodiversity Institute (SANBI), the Southern African python, also known as a rock python or African rock python, is the largest snake in southern Africa.
The males can weigh up to 44kg and reach lengths of up to 4.25m. The females can be even larger, weighing up to 55kg and reaching lengths of 5.0m. The reptiles can live for more than 27 years.
The snakes control dassies and cane rats, especially in KwaZulu-Natal’s sugarcane fields, according to SANBI.
Southern African pythons are protected and vulnerable, and it is illegal to capture or kill them.
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