Mum-of-two bitten by snake which ‘jumped from bushes after smelling meat in ALDI shopping bag’
Woman was walking near her home in suburban Worcester when slithering reptile leapt out of hedgerow and sank its fangs into the back of her leg
A MOTHER who was carrying her ALDI supermarket shopping through a city suburb was bitten by a venomous snake on her way home.
Terrified Patricia Bullock, 57, was left in agony after the slithering reptile emerged from the bushes and sank its fangs into her leg last Sunday.
The mum-of-two thinks the unidentified snake was attracted by the smell of a raw chicken in her shopping bag.
She had been walking down Lansdowne Crescent in Worcester at around 3pm after a shopping trip to Aldi in the city centre when she was attacked by the creature.
After biting her on the calf Patricia was left suffering from shock and flu like symptoms.
Environmental health experts are now warning the animal may be an “exotic pet” which has escaped from someone's house and is believe to be still-at-large
She said: “It was around 3pm and I had just been into town, I was walking back past some hedgerows.
“I had bought a raw chicken from Aldi and I was walking back home carrying it in a carrier bag in my left hand.
“I was only round the corner from my house. I was casually walking across the pavement and there was a hedge on my left.
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“It was brown coloured and very quick, I caught it from my side view and it just lashed out at me.
“t was as quick as anything. It lashed out from the bushes and grabbed my leg. As it lashed out, it hit the carrier bag to get the chicken, but it got my leg instead.
“It bit me and then it was gone - I was absolutely shocked. The pain was like having a glass cut and my leg started to burn like it was on fire.
“I rushed home as quickly as I could and I had a massive red ring around the bite on my calf from my base of my foot to the top of my leg.
“I sat down and I pushed the edges of the red ring and I squeezed out most of the poison until it started to bleed.
“That's when I noticed the two marks from the snake's teeth. For the first few days, I was in shock more than anything. I was shaken and nauseous.
“I can't sleep at night because I have visions that the snake is going to lash out at me. I went to the doctors on Thursday just to have a check-up.
“My blood pressure was slightly high but it was nothing to worry about.”
After getting advice from a pharmacy and seeing her GP, who asked her to contact the RSPCA, Patricia says she is better now but wants people to be aware.
Patricia, who works as a housekeeper, added: “I've had flu-like symptoms but imagine if this was a child it had bitten.
“Along this path I see so many old people, so many pets being taken on walks, dogs are around here, it is very busy.”
Nigel Hands, a snake expert, said: “In the middle of Landsdowne Crescent it's unlikely to have been an adder, it's more likely an escaped 'exotic pet'.
“In urban areas occasionally grass snakes turn up in gardens, but adders are very choosy about their locations.
“I think someone may well have lost a pet but snakes aren't out to hurt people, it was most likely frightened.”
There are three types of snake in the UK, the most common being adders, and the last person to die from a bite was back in 1975.
They are extremely rare in urban areas but in the nearby Malvern Hills it is thought to have anything between 50 and 100 of them.
Mark Cox, from Worcestershire Regulatory Services, said: “We licence people who keep dangerous and wild animals and don't know of anyone who was lost a pet, if they did, they would lose their licence.”
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