Encounters Archives - Snakey Sue’s Serpent Sanctuary

Visitors to the Snake Sanctuary

Posted by Snakey-Sue on December 22, 2019

There are approx. 30 snakes living in the sanctuary, most of them are handleable. we choose which snakes can be handled on the day as they cannot be handled when they are in slough (shedding their skins) or have just eaten.

There are two levels to the coach house and the smaller snakes are upstairs so we usually head upstairs to experience those first and check the larger snakes afterwards. Photos can be taken.

The photo on the left is the downstairs of the sanctuary, the photo on the right is the upstairs where a visitor is handling one of the Albino Burmese Pythons.

Here are some of the snakes in the Sanctuary:

Kenny the Kenyan Sand Boa,

Patches a Royal Python,

Bobo a Boa Constrictor.

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Live Snake Encounters at Disability Trust – Harwich

Posted by Snakey-Sue on July 27, 2019

Live Snake Encounters at Disability Trust:

So many folk overcome their fear of the unknown when they meet snakes.

We don’t meet snakes in everyday life here in Britain, so many people are afraid without really knowing why.

People pick up on negative media stories easily without proper investigation.

Sue has been taking in peoples unwanted pet snakes since 1996.

She began running educational presentations to create finance to care for them and also to educate the public.

Sue has a passion to educate people about snakes and is over the moon when previously snake phobic people realise that they are actually therapeutic to be with.

Sue was recently booked for the above to run her presentation with her friendly reptiles.

The children came to help and held lots of snakes while Sue was busy 🙂

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Experience Snake Encounters

Posted by Snakey-Sue on May 3, 2019

Experience Snake Encounters at Snakey Sue’s Serpent Sanctuary they’re available on Thursdays, Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays, Times 14.30 to 16.00 or 16.30 to 18.00.

We can comfortably accommodate 4 visitors these sessions are £80.

Please ring for availability as our Experience is advertised on Airbnb.

The Snake Sanctuary is situated in a 140yr old Coach house on our property and it has been adapted for the welfare of the snakes.

Snakey Sue and her lovable snakes can get you over your phobia or if you aren’t afraid you can enjoy handling them and having photos taken.

Sue has kept snakes since 1992 and has a wealth of information to impart to visitors, children can take home a souvenir shed snake-skin.

The Coach house has two levels and the steps to the top level are not for the faint-hearted but the snakes from the upstairs level can be brought down for handling if necessary.

We also have two tarantula “Charlie and Sam” and a giant African Land Snail “Winnie”. In the warmer months our two rescue tortoise “Tommy and Bobby” may be seen in the courtyard. There are two big fluffy Chows to meet if you like dogs otherwise they will be kept indoors.

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Local nursery visit

Posted by Snakey-Sue on August 7, 2018

Local nursery visit – We were invited to take a few snakes to Wix and Wrabness nursery for an fun, educational visit.

It was a pleasure to have so much help from teachers and parents helping to handle the snakes and show them to the children.

It’s a good idea to get children used to meeting different types of wild creatures so that they don’t have unnecessary fears in the future.

So many people call Sue when they find a slow worm (legless lizard) in their gardens because they lack knowledge of indigenous wildlife.

Sue has created a board with photos of the snakes that are wild in the UK so that I can teach children what to expect to see in the wild or even in the garden.

Filed Under: Encounters, School Visits | Tagged:

Essex Fire Station open day – Harwich

Posted by Snakey-Sue on September 4, 2017

I and one of my volunteers took the snakes to the above venue for snake snuggles and phobia busting.

Pics up soon

Filed Under: Encounters, Fetes and Fun Days | Tagged:

Snake phobias overcome at NFTS

Posted by Snakey-Sue on March 27, 2017

Snake phobias overcome at NFTS: we visited The National Film and Television School at Beaconsfield where Jenny Kuznetsova was running a short film on snake phobia, quite a few people overcame their fears some just wanted a snake snuggle with Bou one of our Albino Burmese Pythons:

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Snake Encounter Birthday parties

Posted by Snakey-Sue on June 30, 2016

Snake encounter birthday parties – lots of fun for children and adults often meeting snakes often for the first time.

People are frequently quite amazed at what a fascinating experience it is to meet a snake, so much negative press instils unnecessary fear into people.

Our educational presentations teach a huge amount about snakes for the first 20mins. and that helps the process of eliminating fear before the snakes are introduced.

Many people mistakenly believe that all snakes are venomous when very few types of snake are and we don’t keep any of those. When people find out that our snakes are constrictors, they then imagine they are going to strangle us, snakes do not strangle their prey they constrict which means they need to wrap their whole body around their prey and they will usually only constrict prey items of the correct size, we are too large to be prey items, besides it seems that snakes aren’t the unintelligent creatures that people think they are, for instance they know who I am – their carer and will often reach out to come back to me when someone else is holding them. They also get to know the volunteers and will like to be with them.

We teach people how to interact with the snakes and not to allow them to wrap tightly around the neck as they may wrap too tightly because they do not want to fall or are picking up nervous energy from the person which in turn can create nervous tension within the snake.

Snakes are very aware of the energy of the person attempting to handle them, if a person is nervous they may pick up on that energy and not want to stay, calm people find it easy to handle a snake and the snake will find it soothing to be with such a person.

They are most tolerant of being handled by children as you can see in the photos below:

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Dovercourt Skating Rink live snake event

Posted by Snakey-Sue on June 15, 2016

Dovercourt Skating Rink live snake event was not as busy as usual but plenty of fun was had by the folks that did turn up.

We will do another event there, probably an outside one in the warm weather where people can see what goes on, also lots more advertising of the event.

We ran three separate hourly sessions as we do at schools. An event like this one has the educational element, a talk first to inform everyone about the sanctuary, the snakes and what to expect when they are handled. Everyone also gets to see hatched snake eggs, to see and touch shed snakeskins and to see the skin from the largest snake that lives in the sanctuary, he is 9ft long and weighs 20kls!

Large outside events don’t have the talk element so sometimes people don’t know what to expect when they handle the snakes, although we do have many volunteers at these events to show people how to be with the snakes and help them with any fears they may have.

Snakes put a smile on peoples’ faces as you can see in photos below……………………

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Snake Encounters at Dovercourt Skate Rink – 1st June

Posted by Snakey-Sue on May 27, 2016

Snake Encounters at Dovercourt Skate Rink, 1st June 2016 – Lower Marine Parade,CO12 3ST – sessions are 11am to 12noon, 12noon to 1pm and 1pm to 2pm. £7.50 per person
Talk presentations plus handling snakes, only 15 persons per session – to book ring: 01255 551296

Kimba pictured below will be helping out with handling as well as one other volunteer and one of the albino pythons will also be there 🙂

http://www.simplyskating.co.uk