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RAUK - Archived Forum - Spring behaviour

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Spring behaviour:

Author	Message
Tony Phelps Forum Specialist Joined: 09 Mar 2003 No. of posts: 575 View other posts by Tony Phelps	Posted: 24 Apr 2004 Furzebrook today. First - adult male brown phase (7yr old) 420mm. Second - Adder males were whizzing about this morning, and then I spotted one of my old male smooth snakes (22yr) in the same locality chasing another male, a 12yr old. They were moving very rapidly, and although the picture does not really show it the chasing male was inflating the throat. I have only seen this once before since the ice age when I first started, and then it was in thicker cover. This old male was only 10m away from his tin which he has now occupied for 15yrs. Shall go tomorrow and check on the adder activity. I find it much harder to get shots of moving subjects with the digi, mainly because I am never sure when it has fired and what shutter speed its at!! Technology! Pah! Tony

Geoff Simpson Member Joined: 11 Feb 2004 No. of posts: 12 View other posts by Geoff Simpson	Posted: 24 Apr 2004 Tony How can you tell the age of these adders so accurately? Though I guess the answer is you recognise individuals over many years. Thanks Geoff Geoff Simpson38101.7611111111

Tony Phelps Forum Specialist Joined: 09 Mar 2003 No. of posts: 575 View other posts by Tony Phelps	Posted: 24 Apr 2004 Hi Geoff, Many adders were recorded when adult back in the 70's, a few are still around today, others when they were immatures, and some of the latter are now old girls and boys. have only been doing photo ID since 1988, and as I never clipped neos this is the only positive ID from that date if you see what I mean. Since that time I have ID'd 950 neos and recovered 86 either as immatures or young adults. I also find a few first record young adults each season, the ones that slip through the net as immatures. Its worth remembering that mortality during the first three years of life is around 90%. The same goes for smooth snakes, although I catch a much higher proportion of immatures and males. Males seem to outnumber females as high as 3:1 on some sites. If anyone else has such data I would be interested to hear???? Tony

GemmaJF Admin Group Joined: 25 Jan 2003 No. of posts: 2090 View other posts by GemmaJF	Posted: 25 Apr 2004 (Sorry for delay in posting Tony, been out playing with big lumpy noots) Gemma Fairchild, Independent Ecological Consultant

- Spring behaviour

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