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RAUK - Archived Forum - Smooth Snake

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Smooth Snake:

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Mark Slade
Member
Joined: 18 May 2004
No. of posts: 2


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Posted: 18 May 2004
I have just sited a smooth snake in our garden in North Dorset.
Is this rare for this area?
Tony Phelps
Forum Specialist
Joined: 09 Mar 2003
No. of posts: 575


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Posted: 19 May 2004

Very if not impossible where exactly? got description, size colour, scalation, markings, photo?

Tony
Mark Slade
Member
Joined: 18 May 2004
No. of posts: 2


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Posted: 20 May 2004
Tony,
It definitely was a smooth snake. A female, greyish, with distinctive parallel lines of dots along its tail. We are in Sturminster Newton.
I could not get a photo by the time I went back in the house to get my camera it had gone. Typical.

Regards
Mark

Tony Phelps
Forum Specialist
Joined: 09 Mar 2003
No. of posts: 575


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Posted: 20 May 2004
Hi Mark
Hope you find it again, if it is a smooth snake then this will be really interesting and the area would need to be surveyed; get in touch with HCT, there is a link on the forum, talk to Chris Gleed-Owen, bet he's read this anyway.

Cheers
Tony
LadyPenelope
Member
Joined: 12 Jun 2004
No. of posts: 2


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Posted: 12 Jun 2004

Yes, it would be great if this magnificent, yet sadly dissapearing creature began popping up all over Britain again!!

I surely hope it was a smooth snake and not a slow worm which also has a resemblance to this creature, but your descirption certainly suggests that Coronella austriaca was indeed what you saw and fingers crossed it may come back again!

Good luck, Liz C.

P.S Tony, Is the smooth snake greatly distributed throughout Hampshire, or only in certain parts of it?

 


www.freewebs.com/ladypenelope

(Nothing to do with reptiles but your teenage daughter might like it!!!)
Chris G-O
Member
Joined: 14 May 2003
No. of posts: 36


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Posted: 23 Jul 2004
Please please get a photo or tell us the details.
God knows how many times i get people writing/phoning in with excited records from unlikely places - i write back asking for details or photo and never hear anything again. If this is a heavily marked slow-worm (we have all-over 'pin-striped' ones here!) it would be nice to know so no-one goes up there on a wild goose chase. If it may still be a smooth snake, we really ought to know. Does anyone know how to contact Martin Slade???

cheers
Chris
Chris Gleed-Owen, Research & Monitoring Officer, The HCT & BHS Research Committee Chair
David Bird
Forum Specialist
Joined: 17 Feb 2003
No. of posts: 515


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Posted: 27 Jul 2004
Why is that Mark Slade's brother Chis ?
On a more serious note I do know Sturminster Newton well being in my neck of the woods and there is no habitat that would be remotely suitable for Smooth Snakes as far as I know. I think it may be an abberant colour form of a Grass Snake perhaps one shedding where the body marks can sometimes not be seen in some specimens. I have been to Stur. several times on hunts for rare animals such as Mole Cricket which I have been informed of and have always drawn a blank.
British Herpetological Society Librarian and member of B.H.S Conservation Committee. Self employed Herpetological Consultant and Field Worker.

- Smooth Snake

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