Man where do I start.
Most pet shops carry a range of spiders, scorpians and snakes you can buy as pets here. The most popular spider is the North Queensland bird eating spider.
Many years ago I used to date a girl whose auntie lives in Gympie (QLD) and studies spiders. At the time she was studying the white tailed spider, the one that in some cases it's bite causes necrotising arachnidism. That's where the bite area dies and and the tissue appears eat itself. Always used to love visiting her property in the hills outside of Gympie, there were some pretty awesome mountain bike tracks up there.
About 10 years ago I was in a pub and got bitten by a red back spider. It fell out of the umbrella we were sitting under and bit me on the ear. My ear ended up swelling up and I was a bit sick. To this day, I have a small red dot on my earlobe where I got bitten.
I caught my first snake when I was 6. We were playing in a nieghbours back yard and yellow faced whip snake came out of the trees and I picked it up. It was my first pet. Kept it in a 6 foot fish tank for 3 years, untill I let it go.
I have caught 8 of the 10 most poisonoues land snakes in Australia. The two I haven't caught are the Death Adder and Mulga Snake. Dad and I did come across a 6 foot Mulga once when I was 15 and we were bushwalking, but it was too big and too aggressive and when it started to chase us, I gave up trying to catch it. My most scariest (snake) moment came when I was swimming in a creek in Tassie (Tasmania) and a tiger snake swam right in front of me, but I ended up catching it. The funniest was catching a taipan out from under a cast iron bath tub at Ipswich. The second funniest occured on a camping trip in the Coomera Valley. I was relieving myself behind a gum tree and looked down to see a rather wet red bellied black snake. Needless to say I didn't catch that one, but did catch my first red bellied black snake during that trip.
What most people don't know is that a lot of sea snakes found off the coast of Australia are far deadlier than our land snakes.
However my scariest moment came when I was 16. I was on a 10 day Outward Bound camping trip outside of Townsville. We were travelling down a shallow creek on lilows, with our back packs on the pillows. We had just come off a particularly shallow and rocky section which entered into a lagoon. The body section of my lilow had ripped on the rocks and I was left sitting on the pillow, with my backpack on my thighs and my lower legs in the water, trying to blow up a spare lilow. All I could think about was "farkin crocs" and I'm screaming at the top of my lungs "make a farkin raft around me you ***". We didn't see any crocs, but there were some very large slides on the banks of the lagoon. Between that, and having a sharks tooth pulled out of my foot when I was 8 (must of stepped on it, I was waist deep in the Bribie Island passage), I now have a fear of deepish water, especially at night.
The Australian wildlife isn't that dangerous. More cyclists are killed on our roads each year, than are people killed by crocs, sharks, snakes or kangaroos. And yes Kangaroos can kill you. I have been chased by a big buck out at Carnarvon Gorge, and on the same camping trip a lady got attacked by a buck (probably the same one) and was gored when kicked in the belly by it, she survived.
Anyway, if 22 million bmc riding ACF's can survive down here, I'm sure the average tourist has nothing to worry about. Just don't visit Bondi beach, to many drunken loutish brits, and don't ride your bike in Sydney, worst roads in Australia.
Most pet shops carry a range of spiders, scorpians and snakes you can buy as pets here. The most popular spider is the North Queensland bird eating spider.
Many years ago I used to date a girl whose auntie lives in Gympie (QLD) and studies spiders. At the time she was studying the white tailed spider, the one that in some cases it's bite causes necrotising arachnidism. That's where the bite area dies and and the tissue appears eat itself. Always used to love visiting her property in the hills outside of Gympie, there were some pretty awesome mountain bike tracks up there.
About 10 years ago I was in a pub and got bitten by a red back spider. It fell out of the umbrella we were sitting under and bit me on the ear. My ear ended up swelling up and I was a bit sick. To this day, I have a small red dot on my earlobe where I got bitten.
I caught my first snake when I was 6. We were playing in a nieghbours back yard and yellow faced whip snake came out of the trees and I picked it up. It was my first pet. Kept it in a 6 foot fish tank for 3 years, untill I let it go.
I have caught 8 of the 10 most poisonoues land snakes in Australia. The two I haven't caught are the Death Adder and Mulga Snake. Dad and I did come across a 6 foot Mulga once when I was 15 and we were bushwalking, but it was too big and too aggressive and when it started to chase us, I gave up trying to catch it. My most scariest (snake) moment came when I was swimming in a creek in Tassie (Tasmania) and a tiger snake swam right in front of me, but I ended up catching it. The funniest was catching a taipan out from under a cast iron bath tub at Ipswich. The second funniest occured on a camping trip in the Coomera Valley. I was relieving myself behind a gum tree and looked down to see a rather wet red bellied black snake. Needless to say I didn't catch that one, but did catch my first red bellied black snake during that trip.
What most people don't know is that a lot of sea snakes found off the coast of Australia are far deadlier than our land snakes.
However my scariest moment came when I was 16. I was on a 10 day Outward Bound camping trip outside of Townsville. We were travelling down a shallow creek on lilows, with our back packs on the pillows. We had just come off a particularly shallow and rocky section which entered into a lagoon. The body section of my lilow had ripped on the rocks and I was left sitting on the pillow, with my backpack on my thighs and my lower legs in the water, trying to blow up a spare lilow. All I could think about was "farkin crocs" and I'm screaming at the top of my lungs "make a farkin raft around me you ***". We didn't see any crocs, but there were some very large slides on the banks of the lagoon. Between that, and having a sharks tooth pulled out of my foot when I was 8 (must of stepped on it, I was waist deep in the Bribie Island passage), I now have a fear of deepish water, especially at night.
The Australian wildlife isn't that dangerous. More cyclists are killed on our roads each year, than are people killed by crocs, sharks, snakes or kangaroos. And yes Kangaroos can kill you. I have been chased by a big buck out at Carnarvon Gorge, and on the same camping trip a lady got attacked by a buck (probably the same one) and was gored when kicked in the belly by it, she survived.
Anyway, if 22 million bmc riding ACF's can survive down here, I'm sure the average tourist has nothing to worry about. Just don't visit Bondi beach, to many drunken loutish brits, and don't ride your bike in Sydney, worst roads in Australia.