Horseshoe snake
| Horseshoe snake | ||||||||||||
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Horseshoe snake ( Hemorrhois hippocrepis ) |
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| Scientific name | ||||||||||||
| Hemorrhois hippocrepis | ||||||||||||
| ( Linnaeus , 1758) |
The horseshoe whip snake ( Hemorrhois hippocrepis , Syn. : Coluber hippocrepis ) is a snake of the family of snakes . It used to be counted as an angry snake because of its aggressiveness .
description
The snake, which is up to 1.75 meters long, has a number of small labels that separate the eye from the shields of the upper lip. The top is black and has a bluish shimmer. Numerous regularly arranged yellow or chestnut brown spots form a chain pattern of diamond- or egg-shaped black spots that flow together to form a longitudinal band at the back.
There are two black cross bars on the head, one between the eyes and a horseshoe-shaped one behind them, from which this species gets its name. The ventral side is yellowish or orange in color, with a row of black spots on each side and sometimes another in the middle.
Occurrence
The horseshoe snake inhabits the Iberian Peninsula with the exception of the northern areas, the islands of Sardinia and Pantelleria as well as Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia. It was introduced on Mallorca and Ibiza . There are different reports about their occurrence on Lampedusa .
It lives mainly in dry, rocky and sparsely overgrown hill country. She often climbs up bushes and trees. Young animals live mainly on lizards, adults also on mice and birds. The horseshoe snake is considered to be easily irritable and biting.
Subspecies
- H. h. hippocrepis ( Linnaeus , 1758)
- H. h. nigrescens (Cattaneo, 1985) - Pantelleria
literature
- Heinz Schröder: amphibians and reptiles in colors . Otto Maier Verlag, Ravensburg 1973. ISBN 3-473-46116-4
Web links
- Hemorrhois hippocrepis in The Reptile Database
- Photos at www.herp.it
- Distribution in Europe (PDF file; 226 kB)
- Hemorrhois hippocrepis inthe IUCN 2013 Red List of Endangered Species . Posted by: Jose Antonio Mateo Miras, Marc Cheylan, M. Saïd Nouira, Ulrich Joger, Paulo Sá-Sousa, Valentin Pérez-Mellado, Iñigo Martínez-Solano, Roberto Sindaco, Antonio Romano, 2008. Retrieved October 13, 2013.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Spain travel information: Snakes in Spain