Bite puts ban on bare feet
A YORKEYS Knob woman has vowed never to do gardening while barefoot again after being bitten by a snake in her yard.
Vicki McCarthy, 54, was watering her plants about 11.30pm on Tuesday when she was startled by a 1m long darkcoloured snake that sprung at her from the garden and bit her on the foot.
As she was not able to identify the reptile in the dark, Ms McCarthy decided to call an ambulance just in case she had been bitten by a highly venomous snake.
She was taken to Cairns Hospital, where yesterday morning she remained under observation, not showing any symptoms of being envenomated. “I’m pretty lucky,” she said. “As far as I know, it could have been one of the most ven- omous snakes in the world.” Yorkeys Knob man David Pitt, 77, died from a taipan bite in December 2016.
He was bitten twice on his foot when he found the snake in a bedroom and tried to remove it using kitchen tongs.
Ms McCarthy, who lives near the Half Moon Bay Golf Course, said she would no longer be gardening late at night without proper foot protection.
“I’ll have boots up to my knees,” she said.
The Wet Tropics Management Authority advises residents to discourage snakes from taking up residence around their homes by removing likely hiding places such as logs, building materials, long grass, loose rocks, old flower pots and corrugated iron.
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