Eye to eye with an adder

  I was almost disappointed, until today. Whole weekend and not a single snake, not even a grass snake. Then finally under a pile of logs, an adder was basking in the midday sun. Even if people are afraid of snakes, it's so obvious that these reptiles fear us more. Made a couple of pics from distance, but of course when I got closer, it slithered under the logs. I didn't want to give up immediately and I'm not afraid of workout, so I grabbed the first log from the pile, moved it away, continued to the next and so on. Finally after a few logs, the tiny little viper was caught and moved to a place were it could be photographed. When we were done, we decided to move the poor photo model to a safer place, faraway in the forest. Why? People don't like snakes, and the venomous ones are real outlaws, so sooner or later this girl would be a dead snake, if we would've left her where we found her. Here's two head shots of her and some other interesting stuff I saw this weekend.

         

A short trip to Greece

  Had the chance to visit Greece for a few days. Our destination was the Halkidiki peninsula, and there the town of Ouranoupoli. Our main goal was nothing less than to relax and have a dip in the Mediterranean sea. Of course I packed all my camera gear with me as I was hoping to make a few images too. Sea is a good subject for photos as are the olive trees growing all over here and there, so I shot a few landscape images. Had cool little portrait session on the beach with a very atractive lady. And finally a few herp images. My coolest sightings for the trip was a juvenile eastern Montpelier snake, which despite saving its life, bit me. After three days searching I finally found an adult Caspian whip snake, with whom I had a nice photo shoot. And a big surprise was a European blind snake found under a rock. All in all, Greece is an awesome destination, and I wouldn't mind to go there some other time again.

     

In the rain

   Lately we've been trying to learn our dogs to travel by car. The benefits are obvious, it's nicer for the dogs with all those new smells and for me it means maybe a few more images into my portfolio, and of course it's always great to be together with the family and do stuff. On Monday we drove a bit out from the town, unleashed the beasts and started to walk. A Little flipping stones resulted in a nice small smooth snake, but mainly I shot landscapes. Suddenly it started to rain, but as fast as it started as fast it ended too, and finally the sun revealed it self in all its glory. One reminder I got, wast that always carry a towel of some kind with you. Very essential when the rain pours down and gets in to your lens.

Smelly, but rewarding photo shoot...

  Snakes don't like to be photographed. Everybody who've handled snakes know that these, mostly shy animals tend to escape immediately when they have a chance. This is what happens usually, but then there are those rare occasions when an individual snake seem not to be too bothered about your presence. I encountered this type of a snake this week. Of course when I found it, it first stared at me for a sec and then tried to slither away fast, but this time I was faster. My experience with grass snakes is that they don't bite, even if they could, but instead they release a foul smelling surprise from their butt hole and the bad guy who dared to touch it ends up smelling yucky and escapes shocked. My friend in the image wasn't an exception, and immediately when I started to move it to a more suitable location it tried to sprinkle me with its anal odour. After the smelly shower, which seemed to last awhile, my hands were covered in a slimy brown solution and a very strong aroma. Nice! Pouring its smelly surprise on me, probably made it a bit exhausted and it calmed down a bit. Under my cap, which I placed on the ground, the snake coiled, and I took a small break to wipe my hands in the grass just to make the smell go away, at least most of it. Then we were ready for a photo session. Because my friend was so calm and didn't try to escape, I tried to shoot it from different angles...

             

Aesculapian Snake

  Even if snakes and other reptiles do need sun and warmth, it doesn't mean that they are all the time sun bathing. Actually during the hottest time of the day, they try to find shelter and shade, just to cool of a little. And I suppose it's a good idea to get away from the reach and sight of people who most likely wouldn't hesitate to kill one. Here's my first Aesculapian Snake for this year, and I hope to find a couple more of these beautiful reptiles.

Finally snakes (hot spot #2)

  Just a small stop at one of my favorite spots. A tiny little river and its surroundings. Pretty good place for snakes, lizards and frogs and even terrapins. Today was my seson start for snakes. It's just a harmless dice snake, but still a snake. Ended up with stinking hands, one broken nail and the snake got tangled with my camera strap, but we made a few images and we had pretty fun too, or at least I had.

  

How a snake should look

  As the spring is approaching (hopefully), it means that soon there will be lots of all kinds of critters and crawlers around us. When it come to animals, people usually seem to divide them in to two categories, the good ones and the bad ones. In to the "good" category they'll put the cute ones, the majestic ones, and nice ones... cats, sheep, deer, dolphins, squirrels, and so on and so on... I love them too, they are nice. Then there's the "bad" group. That's rats, all kinds of insects, mice and then of course the slithering guys, snakes etc. No one probably would think when they see a squirrel "Ooh, how ugly, it has to be killed! Where is a shovel so that I can cut its head off?!" But alas when they see some of the "bad" category animals, "Kill it, kill it!!!", is the first thought in their mind. That's just so sad. Animals, no matter if they are in our eyes "good" or "bad", should be left alive if they are living in their own habitat and not doing any harm for anyone. Here's a couple of images. The first two are of a completely harmless grass snake and the other two of an other harmless, and actually quite a useful for farmers snake called aesculapian snake. And when looking at the images think, think who's worse for the other, a tiny little snake who's trying to escape when encountered by a human being or the big guy who sees a small snake and plays a big hero by killing that poor critter, and just to show off, lifts the animals body somewhere high so that others can see what kind of a "hero" he is?

This is how a snake definitely shouldn't look. Killed and placed on nature reserve guide sign.

           This is how a grass snake should look. Wild and free. These guys rarely even try to bite.

                                               One sad sight. A farmer friendly snake killed.

                  This is how an Aesculapian snake have to look. Ready to feed on some rodents.