Reptiles & Amphibians

Eye of the tiger, eye of the tiger. Oh no hang on, it's eye of the snake. A coastal carpet python to be precise.

Coastal carpet python (Morelia spilota). And a fine specimen he is too. 2m+ long and about 4kg. Coastal carpets aren't Sydney locals so he's probably an escaped pet. He's in pretty good condition but does have a spinal fracture right down near his tail but it doesn't look too serious and hopefully we won't have to euthanise him.

Yellow Faced Whip Snake (Demansia Psammophis). Mildly venomous, capable of a pretty fair turn of speed and generally more inclined to run away than fight, these are quite common in Sydney. Not that you'll see them very often as they prefer to stay at home with friends; they're not really party animals. Cattai National Park, NSW, November 2005

This diamond python hatchling (morelia spilota spilota) didn't have a great start to life. He was rescued by my wife and I from the house of a famous Australian actress. Her cat had bought it in, causing a couple of very deep lacerations, and dropped it on the patio. The python was pretty stressed out and had a mouth full of fur so he'd put up a good fight. The injuries were deep but not life-threatening. Having been dosed up with antibiotics as a precaution, he recovered very quickly and has become very easy to handle. He has one wound to the mid-body underbelly that we thought might cause problems when he came to shed but when that time arrived, he sloughed off his old skin without any trouble at all. At the time this photo was taken, we were still having problems getting him to feed. His condition was still very good so wasn't a major issue and a few weeks later, he started taking pinkie mice and is now taking food whenever offered. The speed at which pythons, even little ones, can strikes is well impressive.

A Children's python. In Australia, this species is normally referred to as Liasis childreni. There is a bit of confusion though as a number of papers have been published in the last 20 years that have divided the Australian pythons into different species. Consequently, the same species is commonly known as Antaresia childreni in the US. This snake is not a Sydney native and this example is the pet of one of the WIRES North Shore branch members.

Somewhere on this page, you'll find a photo of a very young diamond python hatchling (morelia spilota spilota). This happy little chappy is the same python some 3 months later. Since coming into care after being attacked by a cat, he's more than tripled in size and has sloughed off his skin (without any problems at all) three times. The last time was only a day or so before this photo was taken which is why he's so shiny and clean! We'll be releasing him back into the wild sometime in October when the weather is suitable.

Another Green Tree Snake (Dendrelaphis punctulata). This little guy was a full sized adult weighing in at around 250g. He was rescued from a boys school where the kids had been tormenting him. Rather lucky for the kids that he wasn't something a bit more venomous. He did not like being in care. We kept him for a couple of days to make sure he was OK and then relocated him some way away from places of learning. Hunters Hill, Sydney, September 2006.

Yeah, it's another diamond python (Morelia spilota spilota).... Look, we get a lot of them in care in Sydney and they are very photogenic so they appear a few times on this page OK? This one has had his fair share of troubles. He came it with a terrible mite infestation and was then diagnosed with a potentially fatal stomach obstruction. The mites were easy to treat but the snakey constipation took a lot more work. It all came good in the end though and he's well on the way to full rehab and release.

OK so not an Australian resident. This little chap is a rattlesnake (I think maybe a Mojave) in good ol' Texas

Eastern Tiger Snake (Notechis Scutatus). The tiger usually appears somewhere on any list of the 10 most venomous land snakes in the world. The eastern brown snake and death adder, also Sydney residents, are in the same category of 'getting bitten by one can really stuff up your day'. Cowan, NSW, March 2006. PS: Taken with a zoom lens :-)

OK, OK, the focus and grain on this photo sucks even by my low standards. But this guy is so unusual that it would have been rude -not- to have posted him. This is a true albino Red Bellied Black Snake (Pseudechis Porphyriacus). This guy has been in care since he gave a child a venomous love bite. The little boy made a full recovery after treatment with anti-venom. The snake was taken into care as its chances of survival in the wild were pretty much zero. Photo taken at carers home in February 2006 Some unscrupulous bast*rd stole this snake from its owner in 2010.

What a sad little fellow makes he. Well actually he's a rather lucky fellow. This red bellied black snake (pseudechis porphyriacus) fell into a swimming pool. It was empty. Hurrah! It had just been painted. Bugger! My wife got there just in time. The paint was rapidly drying epoxy pool paint. 10 minutes longer and he would have become a permanent fixture. As it was, she managed to get him in a bag and now we're the proud carers of a red & blue bellied black & blue snake. The good thing about epoxy paints is that they don't contain the sort of chemicals that would poison or burn snakey. The bad thing about them is that you pretty much need a flamethrower to remove them. Now this isn't recommended WIRES care technique so we're just going to have to hang in there and hope that he sheds soon. The paint is actually peeling off on its own which is a rather jolly, if unexpected, development. His underside is, for obvious reasons, much worse than his upperside.

A young adult eastern brown snake (Pseudonaja textilis). Browns have a fearsome reputation. Some of it's well deserved, they're quick, unpredictable and have very, very powerful venom.

Acanthophis cummingi. The death adder. Apparently the 'death' bit is a corruption of the original name 'deaf' because they were often observed to not move when approached and were assumed to be deaf. Actually they're probably just secure in the knowledge that their venom is amongst the most unpleasant on the planet and their speed of strike means that multiple wet bites (wet bites being a bite when venom is injected) can be inflicted in the blink of an eye. People do normally survive being hit by a death adder but only after an unpleasant interlude of being in a coma for a while.....

Red Bellied Black Snake (Pseudechis Porphyriacus). Red bellys have a fearsome reputation amongst the public in Australia but they're actually very timid snakes and would much prefer to run away than sink their fangs into you. Whilst their venom is quite potent, no deaths can be directly attributed to red bellied black snake bites. Having said that, the symptoms are apparently so unpleasant that a bite victim may wish that they were dead.

Another copperhead (Australaps superbus). This one's one of the more colourful morphs. The copperhead is sometimes known as a yellow bellied black snake but apart from being an elapid (fixed, frontal fanged snakes) it isn't much related to the black snake. Just like the king brown is much more closely related to the black than the brown. D'oh.

Generally speaking, this isn't something that you want to be seeing when you wake up in the morning. An eastern brown snake (fast, unpredictable and a potentially a bit dangerous) looking for somewhere pink to envenomate. It's all trick photography, I was half a mile away and no photographers were put at risk during the taking of this shot. OK I lie, I was about 2 metres away. And out of frame, there were two very experienced handlers making sure that there was no risk.

Austrelaps superbus, the copperhead. Fairly venomous and a little unpredictable but without doubt one of the prettiest snakes in Australia. This one had very little of the orange tinge that some of them have. There's a photo of one of the colourful ones on this page.......

A snake with whom you do not want to mess. And yes I know it's not Australian..... Not 100% sure which species it is but a) it's a rattler and b) I think it maybe a mojave

A yellow faced whip snake (Demansia psammophis). Mildly venomous, the reaction to a bite can be painful but they're not dangerous. This one had a run in with a cat and came off slightly second best. Not badly injured but a few scrapes and brusies. You can see some scale damage up at the top left of the photo.

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