Report from Singapore
Posted: Sat Dec 12, 2015 4:57 pmHi Folk,
I wanted to share with you my herping time when I stayed in Singapore (2014-2015). Despite the fact that the city is highly developed and populated, many green areas subsist (parks, gardens, patches of secondary to degraded primary forest and even mangroves). I think I will keep posting in the topic for the next few weeks to cover these different habitats and the associated reptiles or amphibians found.
As a snake enthusiast, I must in first place introduce to you some of the inhabitants of the mangroves found after the sundown. Interestingly they belong mainly to the homalopsid. A family of rear-fanged snakes found in aquatic environment from Pakistan to Australia.
The most commonly spotted in the Singaporean mangroves was the dog-faced water snakes (Cerberus schneiderii), hunting mainly on fishes and usually found in water and small ponds.
I was lucky enough to find few crab-eating homalopsids: the crab-eating water snake (Fordonia leucobalia) and the rare Gerard’s water snake (Gerarda prevostiana). Both eat crabs, but it was demonstrated that Gerard’s water snake hunt mostly freshly moulted crabs (= soft shell). In other hand, the crab-eating water snake attack mostly hard shell crabs. And believe me… crabs in the mangroves are really an abundant prey items…
Hope you enjoyed the post!!
Cheers
Guillaume
I wanted to share with you my herping time when I stayed in Singapore (2014-2015). Despite the fact that the city is highly developed and populated, many green areas subsist (parks, gardens, patches of secondary to degraded primary forest and even mangroves). I think I will keep posting in the topic for the next few weeks to cover these different habitats and the associated reptiles or amphibians found.
As a snake enthusiast, I must in first place introduce to you some of the inhabitants of the mangroves found after the sundown. Interestingly they belong mainly to the homalopsid. A family of rear-fanged snakes found in aquatic environment from Pakistan to Australia.
The most commonly spotted in the Singaporean mangroves was the dog-faced water snakes (Cerberus schneiderii), hunting mainly on fishes and usually found in water and small ponds.
I was lucky enough to find few crab-eating homalopsids: the crab-eating water snake (Fordonia leucobalia) and the rare Gerard’s water snake (Gerarda prevostiana). Both eat crabs, but it was demonstrated that Gerard’s water snake hunt mostly freshly moulted crabs (= soft shell). In other hand, the crab-eating water snake attack mostly hard shell crabs. And believe me… crabs in the mangroves are really an abundant prey items…
- An adult dog-faced water snake (Cerberus schneiderii) crawling on the floor, from pond to pond at low tide.
- A young dog-faced water snake (Cerberus schneiderii) in ambush like position, waiting for fish (??). I have often seen this snake like this, in few centimetres of water.
- Mangrove forest at low tide showing the mudflat. It’s in that mud and small water ponds that most of the snakes where found.
- A Thalassina sp nest. It was reported as the daily shelter for the mangrove homalopsids.
- An adult crab-eating water snake (Fordonia leucobalia) at the entrance of a crab burrow. Presumably hunting.
- Same snake, posing for the camera.
- The rare Gerard’s water snake (Gerarda prevostiana). The only one found after 3 evenings in the mangrove, more than 30 Cerberus and 5 Fordonia were already spotted at that time.
- An adult wolf snake (Lycodon capucinus) found on the board-walk. This lizard hunting species was found at the mangrove entrance, meters away from the salty mud.
Hope you enjoyed the post!!
Cheers
Guillaume
