Grass snake

[Dan Salter]

While conducting a River Corridor Survey with a fellow student Colin yesterday i negotiated a bend close to the waters edge with my eyes stuck on some scrub to try and ID the singing bird....to which i then heard "Never mind the bird what about the huge grass snake your almost standing on!"..i spun round quickly ( sadly) and saw one of the largest grassy's i have seen curled into a tight spiral, basking in yesterdays sun next to my legs...it was very very dark though and even the yellow band was dark brown so for a minute i had to check it wasnt an adder...sadly just as i clicked my camera to the ON position and colin raised his...it straightened out and dived into (and under) the water..( i have only seen them swimming accross the surface).
Sadly i had forgotten Colin has NEVER seen a live grassy (plenty of adders) and i feel my over enthusiastic spin round and "oh yeah cool" was a bit much and i scared it off...so sorry mate ha ha.

[demicav]

That's brilliant, wish I'd have been there. Like I said on another thread I've seen lots of Adders but yet to see my first Grass Snake. Shame on you for scaring it off .