fieldherping.eu

I made a vacation trip to Italy with my fiancee and her twin sister 24.8 - 6.9.
We started with a brief, couple of days stay in Tuscany, which was not dedicated for herping at all, so here I only saw some lizards (Podarcis sicula and P. muralis), a dead Hierophis viridiflavus and a "lucky surprise" -Italian stream frog.
After this we drove off to Piemonte, to the place where my sister lives with her husband and their three children. It's a very nice, peaceful place in the prealps at about 900m asl. Here I would have some time for herping as well. There are common wall lizards everywhere.
Lacerta bilineata was a lot more difficult..
Other critters..
A couple of times we went to the mountains to have picnic. In a mountain lake at 2000m asl. there where still lots of tadpoles of Rana temporaria, surprisingly, in September. Some had already metamorphosed.
Habitat of Rana temporaria at 2000 m above sea level.
Burial of a dead slow worm found by Elia, 5 years old.
I spent a lot of time and effort on trying to find my favourite species, the asp viper, on a mountain slope where I had encountered two individuals back in 2008. This turned out to be not easy at all. Turning some good looking stones here and there I was finally lucky enough to flip a nice asp viper, which was to be the only live snake of the trip.
Finally, towards the end of the trip, two days of continuous rain revealed one very good looking fire salamander, which was kind of a lifer for me because I had only seen larvae of this species before. The salamander was spotted enjoying the wet weather together with a common toad.

Surprisingly, no living Hierophis viridiflavus was seen. This species is present in the area around and occasionally seen in my sister's garden. However, it appears to be a lot more abundant at lower altitudes. Also Natrix natrix is present, but not encountered this time, neither Coronella austriaca.
Anyway, the asp viper and the fire salamander were my top wishes and I was lucky to find both .
Thanks for looking.
Tom

Turning some good looking stones here and there I was finally lucky enough to flip a nice asp viper, which was to be the only live snake of the trip.

A nice and quite large one, congrats! Did you find it also at approx. 2000m asl or was it below?

Tom, nice pics!
Dont worry on your single asp! Its a very good looking one - resembling zinnikeri a bit

Mario

Guillaume, I found the asp on the place shown in the habitat picture (below the viper pictures). It must be almost exactly 1000m asl. I'm pretty sure it was a pregnant female.
Mario, thanks. It was a very good looking one indeed!

Nice findings, nice landscape pics and the asp is great!!!

Thanks, Jürgen!

Great report, Tom. The aspis is beautiful and so is the jelly-lizard. Great finds.

That asp is beautiful! Great pictures! Must be a great vacation!