European snakes

[ngav3]

Today i saw a ladder snake, which inspired me to make this thread....what are some european snakes?

[Sylphie]

In my country (Poland, Europe) we are having only 3 wild snakes. That is: Vipera berus, Natrix Natrix and Zamenis longissimus

[Roman]

We don’t have many snake species here in Europe, but still too many to mention them all in a general thread.

So in general terms we have mostly colubrids and some vipers. There is one species of blindsnakes and two species of sandboas (Eryx jaculus and Eryx miliaris) which can be found in southern Europe and even a Asian pit viper (Halys pit viper Gloydius halys) which just touches Europe in the Russian Ural mountains. There are no Elapids here in Europe.

Probably the most common snake is the Grass snake (Natrix natrix), a water snake like your snakes of the genus Nerodia, which can be found nearly all over Europe in different subspecies. Other water snakes are the dice snake (Natrix tessellata) and the viperine water snake (Natrix maura). There are also rat snakes like the four-lined snake (Elaphe quatuorlineata), the Aesculapian snake (Zamenis longissimus) or the leopard snake (Zamenis situla) and the ladder snake (Rhinechis scalaris), snakes similar to your racers like the Balkan whip snake (Hierophis gemonensis).

There are also some rear fanged snakes like the Montpellier snake (Malpolon monspessulanus).

Most colubrids are between 60 cm and 150 cm in total length (2 – 5 ft) some species may reach a maximum length of 200 cm (ca 7 ft) in southern Europe.

There are also several vipers, in northern Europe it is mostly the European viper (Vipera berus), the largest viper in Europe is the rock viper (Montivipera xanthina).

So if you have any more specific questions I will be happy to answer them.

Here are some pictures of a young grass snake I kept for a short while



and my juv. male Aesculapian snake




Roman

[EL Ziggy]

Very nice info and pics Roman.

[ngav3]

Great info.

[toddnbecka]

Nice pics, the juvie Aesculapian snake looks something like my young climacophora. Different pattern and colors, but has a similar head and body shape, and apparently also like to climb. Are they commonly bred in captivity for the pet trade?

[Roman]

Originally Posted by toddnbecka

Nice pics, the juvie Aesculapian snake looks something like my young climacophora. Different pattern and colors, but has a similar head and body shape, and apparently also like to climb. Are they commonly bred in captivity for the pet trade?

Not really surprising, before the genus Elaphe was restructured several years ago the Aesculapian snake was Elaphe longissima before it was placed into the new (old) genus Zamenis as Zamenis longissimus.

They are at least semi arboreal and really like to climb.

The picture shows the pattern of a very young snake, he was about 5 month old when I took the picture. When he got older the blotches where reduced and show only if he has eaten too much and his belly is a little stretched. Here are two recent pictures showing him at nearly two years, the color will probably get an even darker shade of brown.





Every European snake is protected, so you are not allowed to just go outside and get one. This restricted the availability of European snakes for a long time, when I started more than 30 years ago it was nearly impossible to get any (legally). Today you may get a large selection of captive bred European species, but they are not bred in large enough numbers to have any impact on the pet trade. They are bred and sold by private keepers. You may find them on large expos like the show in Hamm (Germany) or Houten (Netherlands) quite often, on smaller shows you need to be lucky to find any. If you keep them you have to register them the same way as you would register a CITES protected snake with the local administration.

Roman

[ngav3]

I feel like european reptiles as a whole are under appreciated

[toddnbecka]

I just was a pair of leopard rat snakes listed on fauna classsifieds.

[Snake_eyes_88]

Here in the UK we only have 3 species of snake.. Adder/common viper, grass snake and the smooth snake. Although the smooth snake has a very limited habitat range.

[Roman]

Just a little update of my European snakes

My male Aesculapian snake showing his climbing skills





And a new addition I got today. I was just browsing the German version of a reptilian classifieds when I found a new offer of an Eastern Montpellier snake (Malpolon insignitus). I contacted the seller and we came to an agreement, so I got a new snake today I had not planed for…

It is a male, CB 2015 and about 25 cm (10 in) long. I put him in a (very) temporary plastic tub, because currently I don’t have a small terrarium left and we have a holiday here in Germany today, so all shops are closed.










Roman