Gold Coast snakes ‘going ballistic’ in lead up to wild weather

A Gold Coast snake catcher is warning residents to remain vigilant as snakes are “going ballistic” across the city. Here’s why.

A Gold Coast snake catcher is warning residents to remain vigilant as snakes are “going ballistic” in the lead up to wild weather.

Gold Coast and Brisbane Snake Catcher’s Tony Harrison warned residents that snakes were very active at the moment and that the unruly weather today had them ditching sleep to travel across the city.

“I always notice it and I just don’t know the reason why, but the snakes go ballistic … just prior to a low pressure system, about 12 hours beforehand,” he said.

“Snake call-outs double.”

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Jensen Harrison helped to catch the brown tree snake from Ephraim Island. Picture: supplied

He said snakes stopped sleeping and emerged from their hideouts to mate, hunt or travel, which is why more people tended to come across them.

“They just amplify … they get right into it,” he said.

He likened it to New Year’s Eve for people when they became more heightened during the holiday period.

Yesterday, Mr Harrison said he had 11 call outs and already five today — but he expected more before the night was over.

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Snake mating season is underway as well. Picture: Jerad Williams

Four of today’s call outs had been for eastern brown snakes, while a snake bite at Ephraim Island overnight was — luckily — just a juvenile brown tree snake.

“I didn’t finish until 1pm last night,” he said.

A person was also bitten today at Maudsland by an unknown species, but transported stable to hospital.

Mr Harrison reminded residents not to approach snakes they come across and to instead take a picture from a safe distance before calling a snake catcher to safely remove the snake.

The storm predicted to come across the city has already reached the hinterland, however is still believed to have very little rain.

The Bureau of Meteorology’s Jess Gardner said just zero to 1mm was forecast for the fast-moving storms.

“We’ve got some storms moving from the west which is just in response to an upper trough system, with pretty gusty winds,” she said.

“There’s a chance it could be severe … with dry lightning starting fires an issue for further out west.”

She said tomorrow was likely to be dry and partly cloudy.