glad to be a member

[phil]

hi all, glad to have joined the group. some excellent and informative topics raised(not many recently, but understandably so as this is the quiet season) and i hope i can learn much from all of you about keeping herps in outdoor vivaria. anyway i'm a 41 year old bricklayer from oldham. i'm fairly new to amphibian keeping, and bought my first pair of newts a couple of years ago from andrew (pollywog). i have however bred snakes and some lizards for over 20 years now. a hobby that i've never tired of. all my fathers fault!! at 11 years of age he took me to a local pet shop and gave me the choice of a grass-snake or a tortoise, they were both 50p, and like a pillock i chose a grass-snake. i used to get 25p per week spending money. how a wish i'd saved it up and bought a pile of tortoises!!

[morbid]

What species have you bred?

[phil]

hi morbid. to be honest most of the snakes i have bred, were intended for the pet trade, and so were mainly american (and some eurasian) elaphe, but also lampropeltis species, pituopher, eryx colubrinus, all three natrix, most thamnophis. some of my personal favorites were not intended for the trade but more out of my own intrigue, and were diadophis punctatus,ophiodrys aestivus, natrix natrix, maura& tesselata. i also had a pair of western hog-nosed, but the female became egg bound and unfortunately died. i always wanted a pair of leopard snakes, but the only guy who had any, stopped doing snakes, and concentrated on chelonia(marcus langford). which species do you keep morbid? i know you have some vipera, are they difficult to maintain?

[morbid]

I´m into European herps, so.. Do you still keep Natrix? What Elaphes?

Maybe I´m getting Leopard snakes, Zamenis situla, next year..


Yes, I do keep some viperas, like: Vipera a. ammodytes, Vipera orlovi and Gloydius halys caraganus, I also keep lizards: Podarcis sicula cettii, P. pityusensis kameriana and Timon lepidus and Mediodactylus kotschyi, one group of Hyla arborea.

No, they are not actually.. Quite easy. But of course, you have to watch out.. Saftey above all!!

[phil]

i no longer have any elaphe. one of my sons, alex(althepalme) has a pair of miami phase corns. i understand that the rat snake genus has been divided once more and many former elaphes are now under different names, so for simplicity these are the ones i have kept(not always bred) obsoleta,bairdi,emoryi,dione,scalaris,helena&quatorlineata. have no natrix either at the moment, but i may get hold of some grass-snakes in the spring. i don't know of anyone who is currently breeding them in my part of england. and i usually have to drive at least 100 miles to have a good chance of catching any. vipera berus are much easier to find.

[morbid]

I see.. I used to keep quatorlineatas myself, long time ago..

[phil]

big beautiful snakes aren't they. my female was well over 2 metres, and as thick as my wrist. so placid though, would never even hiss.

[morbid]

phil said:

big beautiful snakes aren't they. my female was well over 2 metres, and as thick as my wrist. so placid though, would never even hiss.

Yes, absolutley.. Very "soft" to work with.. Not at all like longissima.

[phil]

not kept longissima, wouldn't mind trying a pair though

[morbid]

phil said:

not kept longissima, wouldn't mind trying a pair though

They are like European Mambas, without the venom offcourse.. Fairly aggressive.

[phil]

when we lived in malaga, i used to keep some coluber hippocrepis. they were nasty but calmed down with a bit of handling. wish we were still there. just about amphibian breeding time now!!

[phil]

plenty of malpolon monspessulanus down there too. got bit several times but never envenomated, although i tended to leave the very large ones alone

[morbid]

phil said:

when we lived in malaga, i used to keep some coluber hippocrepis. they were nasty but calmed down with a bit of handling. wish we were still there. just about amphibian breeding time now!!

It´s possible that I will get hippocrepis this year.. Nice looking snakes.. Offcourse, depending on locality..

[phil]

southern spanish ones tend to have very red blotches, not unlike leopard snakes. have you ever kept coronella? again, i've caught girondica in southern europe, but i've never even seen austriaca. but thats hardly suprising, they're extremely rare in uk. do they occur in sweden?

[morbid]

phil said:

southern spanish ones tend to have very red blotches, not unlike leopard snakes. have you ever kept coronella? again, i've caught girondica in southern europe, but i've never even seen austriaca. but thats hardly suprising, they're extremely rare in uk. do they occur in sweden?

No, I haven´t kept any coronella.. Yes, they can be found in the souther part of Sweden, and actually there is supposed to be a locality just about 5 kilometers from where I live. And I don´t live in the souther part..

Í will try to find animals ther this spring..