Voluntary service for snake relocation

protection, education

conservation

medical treatment 

You must unlearn what you have learned!!!

Yeah! You’ve got me there. I was also a big Star Wars fan.

The point is that most of us humans got wrong education over the past generations.
There are old books just like the bible, who’ve spread wrong believes to people all over the world until today. And certainly humans didn’t know much about reptiles many hundreds if not thousands of years ago. In the past 30 years people started to do a lot of research, and tried to understand the spatial ecology of a few species, and their behavior. In the end they found out very exciting stuff…

If reptiles would wear pants, they would perhaps pee them all the time. That’s not a joke!
If you catch wild snakes, they often urinate all over the place. They don’t want to hurt us.
They don’t want to fight us. They just want to be left alone, and get away.  To them we’re just huge terrifying predators, and they seem to know that they have not many options to survive an attack by us. Retreat or die! But if we don’t give them chance to escape, a bite will be the last resort. So, please don’t try to hurt or kill them. Let them retreat, and you’ll see. Nobody will get hurt.

Therefore the only logical way to convince humans of not killing reptiles can be education.

Presentation in Si Ri Panya International School

Presentation on a Charity Event at Tiki Beach Club Resort

We need to unlearn this nonsense of the holy book, the mainstream media, or even of our anxious parents and grand parents. And then we need to learn what these creatures are, and also what they want from us. Actually nothing! Just a peaceful neighborhood with us. We could easily learn how to live together with cobra nd co.
Nobody needs to get hurt or killed!

Snakes… yes, even the venomous ones… are not our enemies.  As predators, or even apex predators they’re very important for a healthy ecosystem. And we humans need a healthy ecosystem too.

What are apex predators? And what’s their purpose?

Apex predators serve to keep numbers of other predators or herbivores in check.
By weeding out the slow, weak, and dying animals, they increase the health of the population as a whole. However, they actually do much more than that. Left to their own devices, a herd of herbivores, like a deer, will stay in one place, eating everything down to the ground before they move on. However, a healthy predator population (such as our indigenous Reticulated Pythons) will keep a herd (or a population) moving around, looking for cover, and generally trying not to get eaten. This improves the health of the ecosystem as a whole. It leaves smaller plants and grasses for smaller herbivores, prevents erosion, and allows more saplings to mature. This reduces run-off into rivers and streams which in turn reduces flood damage. All of these things are linked to the health and movement of the large prey species.

Phangan has 3 natural terrestrial apex predators. The Asian Water Monitor (Varanus Salvator), the Reticulated Python (Python/Broghammerus Reticulatus) and our majesty (Ophiophagus Hannah). – (images below are in the same order)

They are actually all worldwide protected animals. This also applies for Thailand by the way.

While we can still often find water monitor lizards in creeks, back water ponds or brackish river mouths at the coast, and pythons almost everywhere even close to humans, the King already experiences an enormous decline by habitat loss, deforestation, and human killing, because of superstitious believe and fears, or by poaching for their bushmeat… Continue reading “Conservation by Education”

Harmless Cobra Strike

King Cobra Encounter with Rom Whittaker

Asian Water Monitor Lizard the monks best friend

In Thailand some people still eat them. Some believe they bring bad luck. They call them even “the damned”(Hia). I think this monk makes it clear folks. Monitor Lizards are the primates of the reptile world. Once they make friends to humans they can be faithful friends just like dogs or rather like cats, because they have also their own life, and are not dependent from us. But once socialized they become very curious , and like to hang around with us.

An amazing documentary of the anatomy of our in Thailand more and more rare getting Burmese Python (Python Bivittatus), the next related to our famous Monty, the Reticulated Python. Burmese Pythons got once imported as pets in the US, and released to the wild by people who got overwhelmed by it’s size, and issues to get enough food for such a big animal. Now he is threatening wildlife in the everglades as a top predator. As an understandable result pythons aren’t very popular over there. That’s why they’re allowed to hunt and kill them. I wished humans would be that consequent with other pests of more popular animals. But unfortunately pythons don’t have fur. Anyway… check out, how amazingly evolution has equipped this fantastic creature for it’s successful survival.

A marvel of mother nature.

A short video teaser of a soon airing BBC documentary of the snake research teams at Sakaerat Biosphere Research Centre of the Sakaerat Biosphere Reserve .

The teams do most commonly research about behavior on King Cobras and True Cobras in the north of Thailand.

Since I do Reptile Rescue on the island, I had many chats with people after snake encounters, or also with people who just wanted to know in general, how to behave in such situations. And how to distinguish venomous from non-venomous snakes.

The perception, that most people even rather consider to live beside or with snakes, than removing or even killing them, makes me insanely happy. I’m glad to find so many real nature lovers on Phangan. Most people even change their mind after an educational chat, and let harmless non venomous snakes roam in their house, just like geckos. But of course they need to be 100% sure, that these mostly little intruders don’t cause any harm to their beloved ones. That fact posed me the question, how I can help everyone, to identify and distinguish deadly venomous snakes from similar appearing non-venomous snakes.

That’s why I decided to make this page with all venomous snakes who could at least in theory be indigenous on Phangan. And for comparison I will show you their non-venomous not entirely same looking copy cats.

Let’s start with the 3 deadly venomous snakes, whose existence is approved today.

1. The Monocled Cobra (Naja kaouthia)
2. The King Cobra or Snake Eater (Ophiophagus hannah)
3. The Small Spotted Coral Snake (Calliophis maculiceps)

To number 3 I will come back later…. I didn’t find any good copy cat shots yet.

Instead I come to our first copy cat of mentioned no. 1 and no. 2,  the Indochinese Rat Snake (Ptyas korros)

These 3 snake species variate so extremely in their appearance, people often get confused between N. kaouthia, Ptyas korros and the Ophiophagus hannah, who likes to eat the 2 first mentioned species. If you have the chance to look closer, like on the images, you can see the difference in eye size and the size of the facial scales. If it comes to distinguish color and pattern, it will be difficult even on pictures, because it changes depending on temperature, and also in each individual. They can be brown, olive green, khaki, grey or even black. All 3 have also sometimes marks like spots or speckles. Or even thin bands. So always be careful. The safest way to find out the copy cat, would be to corner it, and see, if it shows us a hood. Rat Snakes don’t do hoods. They blow up the throat vertically. We have some other snakes, who also make hoods in Thailand. But they’re lethal venomous too. It’s for example the Red Necked Keelback (Rhabdophis subminiatus). But as the name reveals, it will show us a red neck hood.

Then we got proof of existence for Bungarus candidus, the Malayan Krait on Samui. But we didn’t have encounters on Phangan yet. Two kinda similar looking, but non-venomous species always cause confusion.  – The Wolf Snake and the Bridle Snake of the family Lycodon. The difference you can see, if you have a closer look on their heads and tails.

Books are showing us the existence of the Banded Krait, Bungarus fasciatus. But it seems to me, that this type didn’t make it to Phangan. Even the local rescue Service couldn’t confirm any encounters with this impressing snake. This time we have a copy cat of the family Boiga. The Cat Snakes. In this case it’s the Mangrove (Cat) Snake. The yellow bands of the Boiga dendrophila are much more narrow, than the bands of B. fasciatus.

Another copy cat of the Cat Snake family would be Boiga cyanea, The Green Cat Snake. In first second it looks really like some sort of Pit Viper. But have a closer look in her eyes. And also lips and nose are totally different. Not just in color. Also the shape reveals the dodger.

Anyway! We don’t see green Pit Vipers on Phangan.

We have two more “actors”. The Oriental Whip Snake (Ahaetulla prasina), and the Red Tailed Racer (Gonyosoma oxycephalum). First mentioned causes confusion because of it’s very similar color, and depending on the viewing angle, the head also looks triangular, like a viper head. But the eyes reveal the main difference. The pupils of Ahaetulla are horizontal, not vertical, like the pupils of Crytelitrops or Trimeresurus albolabris or macrops, the White Lipped Pit Viper and Big Eyed Pit Viper.

After most expats or tourists hear, that we have venomous snakes on the island, it obviously begs the question of how they should proceed in case of a snake or bengal monitor lizard bite. Both mentioned cases may not happen  very often, as we barely get in contact with these very fast and intelligent creatures. And they would also never attack us, as long we don’t corner them. But in case it happens some day, and you’re not sure if the snake was venomous or not, you should always go to the hospital just in case. The first address for people on Phangan is the Phangan Hospital on the images above. They have enough antivenin to send you safely to the Bangkok Hospital at Samui, where they have enough antivenin to get you back on track.

Here now the first aid leaflet, which I’ve nicked from Dr. Jeevan Kuruvilla. Of course with his kind permission. Thank you at this point!