h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I like this very much - your kids are real. I also like the slo-mo passages.

Our next-door neighbours' kids have a snake. At least, I assume the snake is still there, even though the boys have a new baby sister. It's a cute snake A88038507

I will tell my kids they are real. They sometimes express their doubts on this subject. (I know what you really meant).

Last November, a venomous snake (green mamba) escaped some 20km from me. It took them five days to find and capture it. We have a very enthousiastic hands-on TV biologist/zoologist Freek Vonk, who told us that a bite could be lethal within half an hour. This information did not comfort the people who live there. (Really hands on. He has so far been bitten by two sharks, three snakes, a TV anchor, a cayman and contracted maggots under the skin twice (the second time he let them there to see how they developed. This hurt a lot.))

I am familiar with that kind of zoologist. Fortunately, none of my professors were like that. But then, we only handled rats, frogs, and fruit flies.

In the US we describe overenthusiastic zoologists by talking in an Australian accent - because of the late, beloved Steve Irwin. (Cause of death: stingray.)

Your snake looks poisonous - it's a very bright colour. This is a good habit on the part of some creatures - warning people. On the other hand, one of the common poisonous snakes around here is very easily camouflaged. It's the copperhead. This snake is the reason my grandmother never went into her vegetable garden without a hoe.

http://www.imagineourflorida.org/eastern-copperhead/

There are only three kinds of poisonous snakes in Pennsylvania, but we adopt the policy of approaching any unfamiliar noodle with caution. Once we know it's safe, I start oohing and aahing and wanting to touch, while Elektra keeps her distance.

The only bite scar I have is in my right index finger, from a (not so) tame rat.

We have three indigenous types of snake in the Netherlands. Only one is venomous (Viper / adder), one is just a biter (Smooth Snake) and the other is neither (Ringed Snake) but just plays dead and smelly when approached.

It is pretty rare to see any snake here. I have seen some slowworms (which look like small snakes, but aren't)

Ah, a slowworm - that's what they call a blindworm, too, isn't it?

This reminds me of when I was teaching at a Benedictine college in North Carolina. Half of our students were locals and the other half from urban areas 'up north' - New York, Philadelphia, and New Jersey, mostly (although I also taught the ones from further away, like Bulgaria, Israel, and China). Their exposure to the animal kingdom varied, and like all of southwest North Carolina, the campus was full of wildlife.

One day I walked over to the mailroom on an errand. Sign on the door said 'Back in 15', so I sat down a distance away on a bench to enjoy the sunshine. After a few minutes I noticed a large (harmless) black snake doing the same thing near the mailroom door. I made a mental note to tell the Biology professor - she liked having her students explore the campus ecosystem.

About this time, a student arrived, also on an errand to the mailroom. Read the sign. Was about to sit on a rock by the door.

Spotted the snake. Jumped several feet, an impressive broad jump, I thought.

I called to him that the snake wouldn't hurt him. The mailroom guy showed up. I warned him about the snake and said Professor X would be informed, so no hanky-panky with the snake. We mailed our parcels and left.

The way back to our building was an open path lined by old trees. I watched as the student, who told me he was from New Jersey, carefully walked exactly in the middle of the path - looking alertly in all directions.

He'd suddenly developed an entirely new appreciation of his environment.

My wife saved a rabbit from being eaten by a snake (we think, unless it was venomous) This was not in the Netherlands.

It is rare to see snakes here, too (north west England) - there are vipers, but I’ve not seen any. I have seen a grass snake.

I can imagine the leap by that student. . . Exposure to the animal kingdom does vary by place - one of my grandmothers was born in India, and told me of the time she woke up one morning and noticed a venomous snake was sleeping at the end of her bed. Luckily her dad was able to deal with it (and my dad was grateful that the wildlife he had to deal with for me was only non-venomous spiders).

Great episode, with great humour - I particularly like * Scarf is longer than I am tall, but I won't give you the numbers, because I feel taller than that.*

Wow. I think I would have a healthy respect for the snakes of India, myself.