Durban — After getting fewer vine snake calls this season compared to previous seasons, Durban snake rescuer Nick Evans was treated to a few call-outs for the species recently.
Evans said that he had fewer vine snake calls this season than in previous seasons, although mating season (spring) for most other species was also pretty quiet, from his perspective at least.
He said that fortunately, despite the rainy weather, he did have a few vine snake calls coming through.
“Three in the past week. A yearling, in Westville North, which was quite nice to see and two gravid (pregnant) females. One in Moseley, and one today in Westville. Today’s (Monday) female was the bigger of the two, probably around 1.2m in length, maybe slightly longer,” Evans said.
He said that one of the snake’s tails was quite swollen.
“She’ll be given a safe space to lay eggs before being released. In the wild, she’ll lay her eggs and leave them,” Evans explained.
He said vine or twig snakes are highly venomous, but are extremely docile snakes if left alone, and are rarely a “problematic” species.
“Bites are extremely rare and are mostly on handlers (don’t pull their tails), and they rarely venture into homes. They usually stay in shrubs and trees, where they hunt lizards, nestling birds or other snakes. They seem particularly fond of the non-venomous green snakes of the Philothamnus genus, such as bush snakes and natal greens,” Evans explained.
He said these snakes were common around Durban and along the coast.
Evans added that he was keeping notes of all the details of mother snakes, their clutch sizes and the details of the hatchlings.
“It's been quite an interesting process. This time of year is always exciting and busy,” Evans said.
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