A HILLARYS couple has recorded a dugite eating another snake at the weekend.
Vicki and Gil McNaught were walking along the cycle path at Pinnaroo Point about 5.30pm on Saturday when they saw a snake in the nearby grass.
“I couldn’t believe my eyes,” Gil said.
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READ NOW“A dugite was eating a grass snake.
“The dugite was about 6ft long and the grass snake about 3.5ft, and the snake had half the snake in its mouth.
“Unbelievable; I’ve never seen a snake eat a snake.”
Gil contacted Community News to warn people to be on the lookout for snakes.
“This was just off the path and not far from the kids’ playground,” he said.
UPDATE NOVEMBER 2018: WA scientists believe the dugite in the McNaughts’ video is eating another dugite.
Community News sent the video to the WA Museum.
“After having a look and showing the image to another snake mate (Ryan Ellis), we reckon it’s dugite on dugite,” said the museum’s Paul Doughty, who shared the footage and photograph with dugite prey expert Ashleigh Wolfe from Curtin University.
“Cool photo. I concur with Paul,” Dr Wolfe said. “It definitely looks like a dugite eating another dugite.
“I have recorded two confirmed incidences of dugites eating dugites via gut contents dissection at the WA Museum (see table; a dugite is Pseudonaja affinis).
“Eating snakes is a less common but altogether natural occurrence for large elapid Australian snakes such as dugites.”
Dr Wolfe is at the CUBE Behavioural Ecology Lab, at Curtin University’s School of Molecular and Life Sciences.