snake species and their temper

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Re: snake species and their temper

Postby Jeroen Speybroeck » Tue May 26, 2015 8:28 am

Carl Corbidge wrote:Dahl's whip snake bites always seem to itch a lot.

Benny Trapp had some unpleasant effects after a najadum bite, although I cannot remember the details. I believe there was even a picture in his Greece book.

For the sake of the topic, I'll add the story most of you may have read - 3 out of 5 people were bitten by Hemorrhois algirus during our Malta trip, with all three having a lymphoid swelling lump in the armpit of the bitten limb.

I am intrigued by the stories of attacking viridiflavus. Robin, Niklas, may I assume the snake bit when cornered, or did it actually attack 100% unprovoked? I always tell people who snakes are not aggressive if you leave them alone, so...

Guillaume Gomard wrote:I would be interested to know if somebody on this forum could experience something bad after a bite from Malpolon sp.?

I have been bitten by a big insignitus male in 2000. Nothing to report.

Bero, Telescopus and Malpolon are not closely related, even in different families.
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Re: snake species and their temper

Postby Berislav Horvatic » Tue May 26, 2015 2:54 pm

Jeroen Speybroeck wrote:Bero, Telescopus and Malpolon are not closely related, even in different families.

Of course not, but they do have the same "weapon", which neither of them seems to use for defence. And their
reaction when caught and handled is totally different... So, just being rear-fanged doesn't mean much, obviously.
Or does it? Which means, nothing more to discuss, or...?
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Re: snake species and their temper

Postby Bert Vandebosch » Wed May 27, 2015 10:31 pm

as a reaction to
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sBus3YfgKO0
better suited in this thread.

OK it might show Dolichophis is a quite fierce species. But that they react to catching and handling by agressively and relentless biting in most cases is far from true!
If you handle them in the way shown in the video, probably yes. If you provoke it by failing to grab the head twice in one minute in an agressive manner, what do you expect?
Grabbing the head and or neck area will never help to calm a snake.
For me no snake is truly agressive, they are defensive with some species being more fierce in nature.

I don't want to patronise anybody. I'm already glad that people that encounter snakes don't injure or kill them, which still happens in most human/snake encounters.
And I also learned the hard way, with bloody hands and stressed animals on a few occasions.

My experiences: I've catched several Dolichophis on my own and they tried to bite maybe a few times when initially caught. But if you handle them calmly, don't squeeze too much, hold the tail, support the body with a stick (in the same process you can keep the head away from you) and have a bit of patience they calm down and you can make photographs without being bitten. This is a bit more difficult with smaller specimens because our hands are relatively big and pose more of a threat in comparison to their body, but on the other hand it doesn't matter that much as it doesn't hurt that much in those cases.
The same goes for i.e. Hierophis. The adrenaline of the catch and the will to control the "dangerous head" by wanting to grab and hold it, makes situations more stressfull for both the snake and herper.

Just to make my point: With some proper guidance even a 4-year old can handle Hierophis gemonensis ;) : Paco with a subadult
P5220134klein.jpg
For those who worry: I was just outside the picture frame, ready to shield off any possible bite, which ofcourse never happened.
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Re: snake species and their temper

Postby Berislav Horvatic » Wed May 27, 2015 11:21 pm

as a reaction to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sBus3YfgKO0 better suited in this thread.

Both guys featured in this movie are professional biologists & herpetologists with much experience in snakes,
but this particular individual of D. caspius was something much surpassing their expectations... Believe me,
neither of them would ever molest an animal... I've known them personally too long & too well to suspect
anything like that. I just want to make that point clear. Regarding the rest, "it's easy to be a general after
the battle..." No hard feelings. Just, sometimes one just might get "lost" in an (unexpected) "battle"...

When it comes to calming "aggressive" snakes, we have a guy who has "golden hands" to that end, his name
is Mario Zadravec, and he's the father of our young & most able herpetologist Mladen Zadravec. Well, in HIS
hands any "aggressive" snake virtually falls asleep - seen with my own eyes, more than once. So, if he happens
to be around, we just give him the "troublesome" individual to bring it to peace... It's a joy to watch! They
just go to sleep - or whatever one might call the effect - but they certainly relax beyond any expectations...
Golden hands! (Or heart, or soul, or whatewer, ... but it works!)
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Re: snake species and their temper

Postby Ruggero M. » Thu May 28, 2015 7:43 am

Caspius video (thanks Bero!): I think snakes can jump that way only if grabbed by the tail or part of the lower body. In this way, they act like "springs" and the upper body/head can jump, actually bouncing towards the aggressor.
I have an impressive video of a big colubrid (a huge Ptyas mucosa in India, around 3 meters in lenght), grabbed by the tail and jumping towards the face of a young boy.
Personally I know this behaviour in H.viridiflavus. :P

As regards this 3D, I want to say here:
- Elaphe quatuorlineata: in 1 case I saw a captured specimen flattening (vertically) the neck region, opening the mouth, and inflating the upper body in an impressive way, and hissing and threatening to bite (Boris Laus and part of his "team" were with me during that occasion, but the pictures taken are not so representative of the actual behaviour of the snake, and I have no pictures, because I had the animal in my hands...);
- Zamenis longissimus: in few cases (2 cases for sure) I met specimens that were nearly as aggressive as H.viridiflavus... Incredibly, in 1 case the "fierce" Z.longissimus was also olive green in colour, and with barred/striped design. A layman would have thought, from the colour and the aggressive behaviour after capture, it was a viridiflavus, but it actually was a green, particularly coloured and bad tempered longissimus! :shock:
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Re: snake species and their temper

Postby Niklas Ban » Thu May 28, 2015 7:51 am

Jeroen Speybroeck wrote:I am intrigued by the stories of attacking viridiflavus. Robin, Niklas, may I assume the snake bit when cornered, or did it actually attack 100% unprovoked? I always tell people who snakes are not aggressive if you leave them alone, so...

I would not have seen it, when it hadn't try to attack me (an it was still 2m away from me). It was totally crazy I saw a lot of Hierophis viridiflavus but no speciem like this. It had enough space to leave,
so I didn't understand why it was still attacking me. Maybe I just suprised it to hard, that it thought it could not leave. After that my "provocation" started, but it made a photosession impossible so I let it go.
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Re: snake species and their temper

Postby Jeroen Speybroeck » Thu May 28, 2015 7:54 am

Interesting, Niklas, thanks!
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Re: snake species and their temper

Postby Ruggero M. » Thu May 28, 2015 8:07 am

Niklas Ban wrote:
Jeroen Speybroeck wrote:I am intrigued by the stories of attacking viridiflavus. Robin, Niklas, may I assume the snake bit when cornered, or did it actually attack 100% unprovoked? I always tell people who snakes are not aggressive if you leave them alone, so...

I would not have seen it, when it hadn't try to attack me (an it was still 2m away from me). It was totally crazy I saw a lot of Hierophis viridiflavus but no speciem like this. It had enough space to leave,
so I didn't understand why it was still attacking me. Maybe I just suprised it to hard, that it thought it could not leave. After that my "provocation" started, but it made a photosession impossible so I let it go.


My experience:

1) I remember this case very well.
In an open field (with soil, but no vegetation!) not far from my hometown, I saw a black viridiflavus. I went in front of it, and it raised the head/neck region, crawling towards my legs, and threatening to bite/attack me.


2) I remember also this case, and I'm almost sure also this specimen tried to attack me, before escaping.
This big viridiflavus was in the middle of a dirty road, in the woods, near a bent, almost fallen tree. I was in moped, not far from my hometown.
I stopped, and the viridiflavus raised its head and (I'm almost sure to remember well) tried to attack me.
After that attempt, it escaped in the wood, but actually inverted its direction and ran over the bent tree that was lying over the road: so it attacked me at first, escaped in the wood and returned over the road, but this time on the "upper floor", over a falling tree! :lol:
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Re: snake species and their temper

Postby Bert Vandebosch » Thu May 28, 2015 9:16 am

Bero please,
Both guys featured in this movie are professional biologists & herpetologists with much experience in snakes,
but this particular individual of D. caspius was something much surpassing their expectations... Believe me,
neither of them would ever molest an animal... I've known them personally too long & too well to suspect
anything like that. I just want to make that point clear. Regarding the rest, "it's easy to be a general after
the battle..." No hard feelings. Just, sometimes one just might get "lost" in an (unexpected) "battle"...

I don't want to judge some people I don't know by 1 minute video. I don't even mind that they handle snakes like that. ( You probably could have made a similar video with me and a Rhinechis ;) ) I thought I was clear about that by saying
I don't want to patronise anybody. I'm already glad that people that encounter snakes don't injure or kill them, which still happens in most human/snake encounters.
And I also learned the hard way, with bloody hands and stressed animals on a few occasions.

But the video is what it is. They grab the snake's head and that doesn't calm it down... If they are professional scientists, they can take and even will value my minor criticism.

I did want to counter this:
So, H. viridiflavus would "beat" malpolon regarding the fame of being the "fiercest" snake of Europe? Well, maybe...
BTW, have you ever "tried" a Dolichophis caspius? That's a real dragon... There is a movie on You Tube, showing a
big D. caspius, held by the tail, jumping from the ground and just barely missing my friend's head... Very instructive,
regarding the (mis)behaviour of a dedicated fighter...

By sharing my own experiences. As a "soldier who had his own battles", by far not pretending to be a "general".

When it comes to calming "aggressive" snakes, we have a guy who has "golden hands" to that end, his name
is Mario Zadravec, and he's the father of our young & most able herpetologist Mladen Zadravec. Well, in HIS
hands any "aggressive" snake virtually falls asleep - seen with my own eyes, more than once. So, if he happens
to be around, we just give him the "troublesome" individual to bring it to peace... It's a joy to watch! They
just go to sleep - or whatever one might call the effect - but they certainly relax beyond any expectations...
Golden hands! (Or heart, or soul, or whatewer, ... but it works!)


Well I would love to see a video from your "snake whisperer" and learn from that!
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Re: snake species and their temper

Postby Bert Vandebosch » Thu May 28, 2015 9:20 am

Well Niklas and Ruggero:

Very interesting indeed. So snakes might truly be agressive in some occasions.
What time of season did this happen?
Might it have something to do with mating season? They might have been males that want to keep anything away from their mate?
Viridiflavus is known for its male to male combats in spring. Sometimes they maybe go in overdrive...?
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