Snake Identification

[island_sands]

My Dad found this snake in the garden (South Africa).

Anyone know what it is?

[LachlanWA]

It looks like a Boomslang (afrikaans for tree snake). They are highly venomous. http://www.dewsburycrafts.co.za/boomslang.htm. Apparently they come in several different colour schemes.

Lachlan

[deep thinker]

Yep thats a boomslang aka treesnake. They are highly venomous, but they seldom bite humans due to the fact that their fangs are set back far in the mouth and that they are quite skittish. I almost think that one is still a juvenile, the greyish colouring, the bigger ones are normally green. Just for interest sake Ive seen one as long as a combi

[island_sands]

holy crap, will tell Dad before they get too friendly

thanks to you both!

[colt.45]

well I guess it depends on where you live but to me that just looks like a harmles garter snake you can find them just about anywhere and I love to catch them. Also that snake is brownish grey with a blue underbelly the boomslang in the picture is green and seems to have a somewhat differnt body shape

[Lockedin]

This is a fine example of the Southern California "Dirty Rotten Snake"

Actually, it's me burnin' my best friend! (what are friends for?)

[deep thinker]

Colt thats definately a boomslang, its still a youngen though. If you read the article it describes em perfectly, they go green when they are fully grown. The males being bright green almost luminous green at times while the females are a olive green to brownish colour...
Dont think we have garter snakes in sa, I could be mistaken though.
Its easy to mis identify snakes, a mate of mine took his pet brown house snake to school one day and when he put it on the desk for the class to see, his house snake suddenly turned into a cape cobra, not a fun situation for the teacher whith 30 kids staring in amazement as the cobra reared up with its head flattened out, luckily the guy reacted quickly and got its head with a pair of scissors before any damage could be done

[LachlanWA]

I must confess, I've never seen a Boomslang before, I just googled images of South African snakes and found one that resembled Sand's pictures. The head shape and large eyes were fairly distinctive, and patterning on reptiles in general can vary widely between specimens.

[deep thinker]

My first one I saw was when I was a kid, it was one of the luminous green numbers I described, we were picking mulberries for my mates mum and while reaching for a branch I suddenly realized it had eyes, we were out the tree so fast and to this day I still dont know which one of us got the bigger fright

[Amphibious]

Sara, try it with beer batter and some lemon

[island_sands]

Originally Posted by Lockedin

This is a fine example of the Southern California "Dirty Rotten Snake"

Actually, it's me burnin' my best friend! (what are friends for?)

great surfin' pic

[Rockbrother]

Looks like a boomslang to me.
Here is a bright green one, the tail graded to dark green. I took these pics in my garden last year, this one was quite small if you compare it to the rose thorns (not nearly as long as a bus!) These snakes are not very aggressive so they seldom bite. And even if you do get bitten you have a few days to live.

[SurfnSpear]

Boomslang.......
Sara, they must have all stayed the Warners side of the 'toti river . Found them a few times in engine compartments/dashboards...

[island_sands]

My folks lived in Adams Road during toti days

they know live on a plot up near Krugersdorp/Sterkfontein area (its called Thorny Valley, very close to Bartlett Eggs) - loads of thorn (acacia?) trees around.

[sanso]

Hey, deep thinker,

have You considered looking at the ID please group at flickr? Maybe You could save more people from cuddling up too closely with their venomous friends.