It's about time I used some time to get my report in to this forum.
I'll start off with my latest trip - I'm not the best writer, so I will do what I do best - show my photos, with some information. Feel free to ask anything, and I will answer as good as possible.
This time our trip went to the area around Dalyan, Turkey - the target species was Montivipera xanthina and Chamaleo chameleon.
We arrived Dalaman Airport saturday 29.march, and we stayed til 05.april
The reptile species that was most abundant, was Testudo graeca ibera
This specimen, had a missing eye.. but seemed to do well. A big and old specimen - who knows - perhaps he had survived all world wars ?
We did not see to many turtles, but there were some - but I did not use much time on these this year, as we always was on our way to the next potential spot for Xanthina
We off course had to stop by the hot spring near the Dalaman Airport, to have a look at the Nile Soft-shell Turtles (Trionyx tringuis) - we also did see some specimens in the Dalyan River
I had some hopes finding Pelobates, but no luck - we did find 3 other species of amphibians
Pelophylax ridibundus
Bufo viridis
Lycasalamandra fazilae
We did see a few Lacerta trilineata in the start of the trip, and I was always thinking that I could get some good shots of them in the end - after I got some cracking shots of the viper
So this is all I got..
Trachylephis aurata were rather common
Two other lizard species was rather common, the small and swift Ophisops elegans
And off cource, the agama (Laudakia stellio)
On a trip to a waterfall north of Köycegiz we found a couple of specimens of Anatololacerta oertzeni. fabolous little creatures. A dream for a photographer, as they almost follow you around
In the end, we ended up with 5 species of snakes :
Dolocophis jugularis
Natrix natrix persa
Natrix tesselata
Hemmorhois nummifer
Eirenis modestus
And as nyone can understand from that - we did not find our target species..
This species does not cover up for it, in any way :
Blanus strauchi
So I guess I will be back - or travel to another location with M.xanthina