{"id":59343,"date":"2014-05-06T08:30:00","date_gmt":"2014-05-06T06:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/germistoncitynews.co.za\/59343\/residents-shocked-to-find-black-mamba\/"},"modified":"2014-05-08T10:54:12","modified_gmt":"2014-05-08T08:54:12","slug":"residents-shocked-to-find-black-mamba","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/develop.citizen.co.za\/germiston-city-news\/news-headlines\/2014\/05\/06\/residents-shocked-to-find-black-mamba\/","title":{"rendered":"Residents shocked to find black mamba"},"content":{"rendered":"

Last Monday, April 28, at about 4pm Byron Elston received a phone call from a concerned Primrose resident.<\/p>\n

The resident asked Elston, a herpetologist, to come and capture what was believed to be a black mamba from outside their home.<\/p>

<\/div>\n

Elston, who is usually on call for Spoornet to remove and relocate snakes from their switch gear rooms next to the railway lines, also removes snakes from factories and residential areas.<\/p>\n

“The idea is to educate people that they do not need to kill every reptile they see.<\/p>

<\/div>\n

“One of the reasons that we have a rodent problem is because most of the snakes have been removed from residential areas,” said Elston.<\/p>\n

Elston responded to the call thinking it was a common house snake or Rinkhals, as mambas are not naturally found in Gauteng.<\/p>\n

But, as he did not know for sure, the most important thing to do before anything else was to identify the snake.<\/p>\n

Much to Elston’s surprise the snake was indeed a two metre black mamba.<\/p>\n

Elston and his colleague managed to get the snake down and into the container.<\/p>\n

The black mamba is the deadliest snake in South Africa and one of the deadliest in the world.<\/p>\n

Adults average a length of two-and-a-half to three metres and are olive brown or grey in colour, the under body is usually a cream colour.<\/p>\n

Mambas are adapted to a variety of climates, ranging from savanna, woodlands, farmland, rock slopes, and dense forest.<\/p>\n

The snake’s speed, agility and bad temper makes this snake extremely dangerous to handle.<\/p>\n

“It will attack with the least amount of provocation,” added Elston<\/p>\n

The captured snake is now on its way to a facility that will relocate it to its natural habitat.<\/p>\n

How did the snake get to be so far from its natural habitat?<\/p>\n

“It was possibly bought here on the back of a truck.<\/p>\n

“A couple of years ago a black mamba found its way into a fruit market via a load of bananas, much to the alarm of the workers in the market, a similar situation could have happened here,” said Elston.<\/p>\n

If the community has any reptile related questions or if you need a reptile removed from your property Elston can be contacted on 061 340 3041 or emailed at snakeremoval1@yahoo.com.<\/p>\n