Snakes are mysterious creatures â secretive and elusive and, of course without legs, yet they can slither quickly, disappear down holes, swim effectively and climb trees. Many snakes are venomous and some highly so.
There are many people that fear snakes. Some people have a phobia when it comes to snakes and cannot even look at a picture of a snake or will immediately leave the room if a snake appears on television. A great deal of research has been done in this regard and it appears that our fear of snakes is both nature and nurture. To some degree, we are genetically programmed to fear snakes, yet small children show little fear and will often happily touch a snake if the opportunity arises. We are also hard wired to quickly develop a fear of snakes and may be triggered by an aunt screaming to get out of the way when a snake is spotted. Over the years we have had several people that are terrified of snakes attending our snake awareness course and some of them are so terrified that they will drive halfway to the course, turn around and go home. Those that do manage to get through an awareness session have a major change in attitude â still very weary of snakes, but not so terrified as they have a far better understanding of how snakes behave and what their abilities are.