So after a quiet summer of herping in croatia last year, I decided to visit the pyrenees this time. My main goal were (of course) the vipers and especially V. aspis zinnikeri. After a stop near Lourdes for some landscapes we went to a remot spot in the spanish side of the pyrenees for the aspis. After seeing many vultures on our way to the location my hopes were quite high although it was a bit cold and windy. After about 30 minutes of searching I got lucky and found my first V. aspis aspis.
Vipera aspis by Lennart Schmid, auf Flickr
The next days we concentrated on finding the aspis zinnikeri but we had no luck at all, although the weather was perfect. We did however find many Coronella, a bunch of Lacerta bilineata and Calotriton asper.
Bilineata 1.1 by Lennart Aiscan, auf Flickr
DSC_5452 by Lennart Aiscan, auf Flickr
On our last day I finally found another V. aspis, a huge one. However I am not so sure if it is an aspis aspis or aspis zinnikeri. Do any of you know which subspecies it could be?
Aspis 2.1.1 by Lennart Aiscan, auf Flickr
Vipera asis by Lennart Schmid, auf Flickr
On the evening of the same day we tried a new location and finally after days of searching we found our first aspis zinnikeri! .
Zinnikeri 1.2 by Lennart Aiscan, auf Flickr
Vipera aspis zinnikeri by Lennart Schmid, auf Flickr
A friend of mine, who already showed me the place for the aspis told me about an amazing place for Vipera seoanei in the french pyrenees. At first I wouldn´t believe him because he talked about dozens of vipers on only a few square feet.
So of course I went there and it was amazing. I had never seen such a healthy eco system before. There were many frogs, lizards, toads, newts and mice and of course many, many vipers. We stopped counting at 15 the first day but we saw quite a few more. The beautiful part about the seoanei´s was their different colorations, so here are my favorite ones:
A very dark female
Seoanei 1.1.1 by Lennart Aiscan, auf Flickr
Vipera seoanei by Lennart Schmid, auf Flickr
A very light female
Seoanei 4.1.1 by Lennart Aiscan, auf Flickr
Vipera seoanei by Lennart Schmid, auf Flickr
An almost striped female
Seoanei 5.1.1 by Lennart Aiscan, auf Flickr
A patternless female
Seoanei 6.1.1 by Lennart Aiscan, auf Flickr
Seoanei 6.1 by Lennart Aiscan, auf Flickr
A beautiful male (the only male we found)
Seoanei 2.1.1 by Lennart Aiscan, auf Flickr
Vipera seoanei by Lennart Schmid, auf Flickr
And last but not least my favorite one: a black female with some pattern shining through
Seoanei 3.1.1 by Lennart Aiscan, auf Flickr
Viperas seoanei by Lennart Schmid, auf Flickr
After this amazing place we decided to end the herping part of our trip and went to spains atlantic coast. But after I heard of a good place for Chioglossa lusitanica I had to check it out of course .
DSC_6947 by Lennart Aiscan, auf Flickr
One of the best parts of the trip were the landscapes of the pyrenees. These mountains are unbelievably beautiful and so I thought I might share some of my favorite places with you:
Pyrenees waterfall by Lennart Schmid, auf Flickr
Pyrenees creek by Lennart Schmid, auf Flickr
Foggy waterfall by Lennart Schmid, auf Flickr
Foggy trail by Lennart Schmid, auf Flickr
Picos de Europa Waterfall by Lennart Schmid, auf Flickr
I hope you guys enjoyed my little tripreport!