An Australian woman got a surprise Sunday when she spotted a highly venomous, 3-foot long snake wrapped around her Christmas tree, according to multiple reports.
Snake catcher Barry Goldsmith told BBC News the tiger snake got into the woman's suburban Melbourne home through an open door.
The woman snapped a photo of the snake before calling Goldsmith.
Within 20 minutes, Goldsmith had captured the snake. It was later released.
"It's one of the more different ones, but we find them in all sorts of places," Goldsmith told The Guardian. "Tiger snakes are very good climbers."
Despite the shock of finding a deadly snake posing as tinsel, Goldsmith told Australia's ABC News that the woman remained calm throughout the ordeal.
"She was very happy to see the snake go but she was very relaxed," Goldsmith told the news network. "Usually I get people screaming and hysterical and shaking and having seizures just at the thought of having a snake in the house. But she was pretty cool."
Goldsmith told ABC News that Sunday's incident was his first in the last three or four decades as a snake catcher that involved a snake up a Christmas tree.
"This is a one-off thing," he told the news network. "It's like lightning striking. It's not going to happen again, for sure. Not this year, anyway."
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