Snakes: have you ever seen one in the wild, in the UK or anywhere else ?

[WildRosie]

I haven't so my contributions here will be limited. However, I find snakes fascinating creatures, even though they give me the creeps and I sometimes have nasty snake dreams. I'd love to see a grass snake catching some rays after laying her eggs in the spring, or an adder mellowing out among the heather. But I haven't yet. We don't get smooth snakes in Yorkshire so zero chance there. Please share your legless reptile stories. Slow worms don't count.

I've seen them on the roadside in Rhodes and one brown snake in the bush in Australia 🇦🇺

writing = writhing...

A few when Liv in Cyprus. We had some interesting wildlife. I had to swerve to miss a snake whe cycling one day, but I think it was the harmless type. A rather large dog got killed by a snake, which made us all a bit more cautious with the kids. Had lizards I the house frequently.

Seen a few beauties in the IS and Caribbean, including a rattlesnake.

Yes, in the 1990’s out in woodland with my three daughters. We were walking in the sunshine and spotted a snake sunbathing on the sandy path. My youngest daughter was about 5/6 and she wanted me to pick it up. I didn’t, glad I didn’t,they give a nasty nip.

An add in north Cornwall and grass snakes in my pond

Beach in cyprus.

I'm in shock that there are snakes in the UK! How did i not know that

No never, and I know this sounds stupid but up until we went to center parcs 3 years ago and I read in the info booklet to watch out for grass snakes, it never occurred to me there was snakes in the wild here.

Whilst out on a walk about six years ago in the UK, DS2 called me to look at what he'd found. I went over to find him hunched a nose length away from an adder which looked poised to strike. I calmly suggested he slowly stand up and carefully step away...whilst trying not to scream!!

Dcat brought a grass snake in through the cat flap once. She was very pleased with herself. It was writhing around and hissing furiously. I got her to drop it, and it played dead - very theatrically; mouth open, tongue hanging out the side, completely limp.

After showing it to ds I took it down to the bottom of the garden by the compost heap, and then hid behind a bush. Sure enough, after five minutes it decided the coast was clear and slithered off into the undergrowth.

I haven’t seen once since, although the dc found a baby one curled up under a log this summer.

SCREAM

I live in Aus
Ive seen them outdoors many times, from our backyard, to crossing the road, to swimming pools
Ive almost stepped on a brown snake that was laying across doorway as a kid
A few years back we had a brown in our kitchen

@Tearsfortiers I had to look up a black racer, terrifying.

I have seen a beautiful red king snake (harmless) in Costa Rica many years ago. There was some brief excitement that it may be a highly venomous coral snake (they look similar) - but luckily not.

I've seen a few slow worms (yes, I know those are technically not snakes)

On one memorable occaision I met a couple of excited 10 or 11 year old kids in my local woods who had something in an Asda carrier bag. On gentle questioning one boy said 'I've found a snake and I'm taking it home to show my Dad'. I asked if I could see it and it was a rather lively adder !

Thankfully I managed to persuade him that the snake was going to be scared and unhappy if they took him away from his home & it was much better to let him stay in the woods

The new forest used to have a snake centre. Not sure if its still there. Brilliant place.

On holiday in the 80s in Thailand, I would have been 7. We went to watch a tourist show of cobras being milked (to make antidote I think). They made a big show of it, antagonising the poor creatures so they'd put their hoods up etc and eventually doing the milking. But they messed up and one escaped. The audience were all on wooden bleachers, and the snake slithered right up onto one side. Everyone scrambled for the other side and the handler came after it and caught it before any damage was done - but a thoroughly hair raising and totally unsafe crazy set up. Hopefully it wouldn't happen nowadays.

On the same holiday I was allowed to stroke a yellow snake with a triangular shaped body which I was told at the time was extremely poisonous. I'm not sure why I wasn't terrified but I wasn't and I did it quite happily.

Less dramatic, but while I was on holiday in Austria in my mid teens with parents and a friend. Friend and I went climbing up a mountain on our own and decided that instead of walking up the sensible zig zag path, it would be much more fun to scramble straight up through the scrubby undergrowth. About half way up, I went to grab a stick which wriggled and then slithered downwards past me, then my friend. We were both rather shaken and wished we had just taken the normal route.

Oh, and I remember on holiday in Dorset when I would have been about 5/6 finding an adder with its head stove in

Yes. Playing golf and bike riding in Oz, and in general life.
Here in Tx we get them in the garden and we’ve seen them walking in national parks. We saw a very venomous one swimming across a creek one time. Swimming across a creek!

Of course we were doing the walking, not the snakes

We live close to an AONB and there are grass snakes and adders there. I’ve thankfully not yet seen one, I have a snake phobia, but my husband sees them regularly while out mountain biking. He saw an adder last weekend actually, said it was the largest one he’s seen.

I’ve always avoided walking there in the milder and warmer months in case I saw one but they now seem to be around for most of the year. There were reports of sightings last February and obviously when my husband saw one last weekend it was already November.

Excellent stories. May I please just clarify that, yes, we do have adders and grass snakes in Yorkshire. It's smooth snakes that we don't have - I think they're confined to southwestern England as far as Hampshire. I don't know about adders but grass snakes are particularly partial to compost heaps as a suitable site for laying their eggs, on account of the warmth produced by the rotting vegetation and the low likelihood of being disturbed. It's common for several female grass snakes to use the same heap!

Our cat brought in a dead adder

I've seen a few in the UK. Such as this one.

Also saw a brightly coloured small snake in Greece many years ago. No idea what it was

I used to visit Studland bay (in Dorset) with my late husband regularly some years ago, as the Heath is a haven for wildlife and rare plants, especially in late summer and autumn. It’s one of the few places in Britain where all six native reptiles can be found, and we managed to see them all. Adders, grass snakes, the rare smooth snake, slow worms and both the common and sand lizard. I feel quite privileged to have done so.

Oh bloody hell - now I'm going to be scared every time I turn the compost heap - even though I've never found a snake or their eggs in it. Not scared of the snake, but scared of hurting one inadvertently. I live next to a park which is mostly left to meadow and has much totally undisturbed vegetation all around it. I know there are snakes around as my mum who lives on the other side has found grass snakes in her bamboo patch before.
I narrowly avoided decapitating a lizard while digging a flower bed a couple of months ago. Who knew that gardening could be so fraught with opportunities of accidental reptileicide

Adder when I was out walking one very hot February day!
Grasssnake, we have one in our garden, although didn't see it this summer
Garter snakes in France,
Coral Sea snake when snorkelling off Solomon Islands
And a snake in Taiwan when walking in the mountains (I initially thought it was a bit of old rope, and was going to pick it up, when my Taiwanese friends stopped me in the nick of time!😬) never did manage to identify it!

Snakes are cool! Spiders on the other hand...!