Snake’s 'strange' dilemma as 12-hour ordeal unfolds
The snake catcher believes the snake was stuck in more ways than one.
A snake found itself hanging upside down from a tree for 12 hours on Saturday after its prey proved too "heavy" as a morning snack.
A concerned resident spotted the possum dangling from the jaws of a metre-long carpet python in their backyard, with it likely the two animals had "wrestled" in the trees before the snake came out victorious. However, it appears the snake then slipped — with only the end of its tail gripping onto the branch eight metres above the ground.
"The snake was hanging directly down with the possum in its mouth and we just thought it was trying to pull it up into the tree but it must have fallen," Stuart Mckenzie from Sunshine Coast snake catchers told Yahoo News Australia.
He mentioned how "strange" it was for the snake to stay in such a position, believing it had been there for up to 12 hours before he interfered.
Gravity worked against snake in more ways than one
Other than the snake falling from the tree in the first place, it's likely the weight of the possum and the angle of the snake's teeth meant gravity "stuck" the animals together.
"The snake probably didn't want to drop because it didn't know how high up it was... but it's likely the backward facing teeth possibly wedged them [together] and it couldn't let go," Mckenzie said.
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Python was 'relieved' when snake catcher interfered
Mckenzie believes the snake seemed pretty pleased when he separated the two animals, going nowhere near the possum after the snake catcher put it at the base of the tree. "I think it was actually relieved, it went back up the tree. I went out there the next morning and the snake was gone, so I think it was pretty happy to be free" he said.
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