This is the shocking moment a child pulls a plastic snake out of a toy box which turns out to be the real thing - biting him before his horrified dad could react.

The watchful father was standing smoking a cigarette on the balcony as the boy played with the toys in the box at Tongren in Guizhou, China, on April 14.

The area where the incident happened is a tobacco planting and crop agricultural area and the little boy did not realise that the snake was the real thing as he grabbed it a second before his dad realised the danger.

As the snake whipped around and struck the boy in the hand, the dad pulled him away, but the child had already been bitten by this point and burst into tears.

The mother then rushed out and together they went inside, grabbed the car keys, and rushed the child to the hospital.

The child survived but was left with a severely swollen hand as a result of the bite.

The snake was later identified as a Chinese pit viper. The father said that recently there had been several snake attacks.

He added: 'I was only a small distance away and was being careful and yet I still was not able to react in time.'