I’ve dealt with two puff adders first-hand in Camps Bay and with a now, with a cabin in the Klein Karoo mountains, snake awareness is not something I skimp on.

Hence my search for repellers, chemical or otherwise. I’m so glad I found this clever device.

And with so much focus on exterminating or trapping mice and moles, one wonders why we don’t have something clever like this in South Africa to protect us from snakes.

I mean, this IS Africa and snakes CAN kill you. We all remember that horrific story of the Western Cape couple who lost their only child earlier this year, and as we enter summer, it only gets more dangerous.

They reckon there are about 7 000 snakebites in Southern Africa every year, leading to 10 – 50 deaths. Indeed, 98% of snake bite victims survive the ordeal, which is nice to know. But still, I’d rather they weren’t there in the first place, thank you very much.

Our dog, Lacoste, was snake trained at Proud Hounds – Cape Town’s premier doggie daycare outfit, so we’ve done what we can there and will have to hope for the best if there is an encounter. But when you’ve got a laaitie who’s almost two, you want to take further steps.

An overseas friend of mine had mentioned some kind of electronic snake repellents that were on the market – a special device that you plug into the socket in your home and apparently, over time, they clear your property of snakes.

I couldn’t find those and kept searching. That’s when I found these beauties on Amazon, solar powered, nogal! $45 and you get TWO in a box!

With our new partnership with Sustainable, I’m busy making everything in my life solar powered, so this would definitely be the right way to go. Amazon don’t ship this particular product to South Africa, but that’s never a problem when you use Postbox Courier.

My order arrived within a week and here it is. I think this is referred to as an “unboxing.”

Oh – before we get into the product, can we just all agree how amazing it is that Postbox Courier  got this thing to me within a week? For a product that doesn’t even ship to South Africa I think that’s pretty crazy.

Well, not if you get used to using their overseas delivery addresses when ordering. I even use them for products that DO ship to SA – so I don’t have to deal with missing packages – which ALWAYS happens.

Anyway – here’s the box..

According to Amazon:

• DOUBLE EFFECTIVE: Sends out a vibration in every 55 seconds by electric motors. The snake senses vibrations as danger and will quickly move out the area normally never to return
• ELECTRIC MOTORS: VENSMILE The Snake repeller emmits a 2x vibration than other device for chased away snakes, also increased the effective range
• SOLAR POWERED: 312s built-in the best 4.8W Monocrystalline solar panel and 2x 1200mA recharge battery, perfect provide this device work 24 hours
• UP to 7500 Square feet of coverage range, so they can be placed approx 40 m (130ft) apart to get optimum coverage, it is always recommended to use two or more units to get the best results
  100%
• HUMAIN and SAFE, No Toxic Chemicals, is safe for use around pets and children

All-in-all, some great points.

You can read the reviews people have written about the product here (click and scroll down).

I’ll be installing them at the cabin later this week and will report back!

In the meantime, read up on how hectic the snake vibe in SA is here, here and here.