Chiclanagir

I agree Bill............my hairdresser was telling me last week how there was a 3ft snake in her garden and they killed it and half an hour later it was still alive. Horrible.

jdr

Me too, they do no harm.
I sadly had to finish one off as it had been serously damaged by a digger bucket.

bil

Yeah, there's a lot of misconceptions about snakes. I love reptiles. Last week I spotted a large eyed lizard running down the ditch near the house. Really nice to see it there. Sadly, I see the odd one run over, and my suspicion is that people aim at them.

jdr

I have one called Eddie, he hangs onto the inside of the garden shed door which is galvanised steel and gets hot enough to burn your hand.

bil

Ah, a gecko? This was a two foot long green lizard.

fionamw

One of 9yo's friends' birthday party guests was running around with a full-blown chameleon the gang had found in the rocks......

bil

Shame to treat a living creature like a toy. Too much stress and it won't recover.

megmet

We have a colony of geckos living with us, they are very entertaining to watch, we love them and stop our cat getting to them as much as we can.

The snake I killed was in fact an asp, they have been known to venture into the houses around here in the summertime when our doors are always open.
The harmless kind can live....but not the ones that can do us harm...sorry!

bil

What did it look like? I didn't think there was an asp in Spain.

fionamw

To be fair, that was journalistic licence. He's a bit of a science nerd and held it very carefully on, if I remember a piece of wood from the garden, and was equally careful (once looked at by a few friends) to put it back where originally found.

fionamw

.. and back on geckos, I love their little chirruping calls!

megmet

There are five venomous snakes in Spain Bill of which the Asp Viper is one...without doubt it's the one that surcomed to my garden spade, we had time to study it in detail once it was dead.

Common names: asp, asp viper, European asp, aspic viper, more.
Vipera aspis is a venomous viper species found in southwestern Europe. Bites from this species can be more severe than from the European adder, V. berus; not only can they be very painful, but according to Stemmler (1971), about 4% of all untreated bites are fatal. The specific name, aspis, is a Greek word that means "viper."

megmet

Me too!
Over the last couple of weeks ours have been mating so they are talking to each other a lot at the moment....amongst other things.

bil

Ah, asp viper. You basically came across a viper. You threw me with asp, because I don't remember that as ever being a European snake.

I have here a copy of the 'Reptiles and Amphibia of Britain and Europe" which lists only three vipers in Spain, the asp viper very much in north east spain along the French border, the Lantaste's viper in the rest of Spain and the common adder along Spain's N coast.

I think the only other one is the Monpelier snake which is a rear fang and not really dangerous. The fifth?

megmet

Take a look here....
http://www.ruralspain.info/snakesinspain.htm