Poisonous things

Some things in the garden are more welcome than others. Things such as butterflies and kittens make you very happy. But what when you find Bulgaria’s most poisonous snake in your back garden? We had already heard some hissing, and we had noticed a snake was living near the pile of old and half rotten wood. But snakes are quite common here, and most are not dangerous, so no immediate need for worry.

Nose-horned Viper in a pile of wood

Nose horned viper (Vipera ammodytes) – Bulgaria’s most poisonous snake in our garden

The Nose-horned Viper (Vipera ammodytes) occurs from North Italy and South Austria throughout most of Balkan peninsula to Western Caucasia. It inhabits dry and sunny habitats, usually rocky and stony places. It mainly eats rodents and lizards, and can be recognised by the small “horn” on its nose. The bite of this snake is dangerous; if it bites it injects about 4 times as much poison compared to the Adder, and its 5 millimetre long fangs make injection of venom extra efficient. It is the most dangerous snake that occurs in Europe. If this snake bites you, you need to go to hospital quick for a special serum, otherwise death could be the result.

Moving a snake

And when we had some young Bulgarians friends over for dinner, we finally saw the snake; its small horn was very obvious! Mmmm. We were quite keen to make sure it was not harmed, because the species is protected (Annex II Bern Convention, and by Bulgarian law), but we were also quite keen to get rid of it!

Luckily, one of our dinner guests has travelled to Thailand recently, and has seen how people in more tropical parts of the world deal with a situation like this. Even though we read aloud from our book on the “amphibians and reptiles in Bulgaria” (Beshkov & Nanev, 2006) that most bites are the result of unskilled attempts at catching the snake, our friend was not to be deterred. He found the situation for us too dangerous. Armed with thick gloves, a bag and an ingenious, quickly improvised device (a piece of plastic plumbing pipe with a piece of string through it; one end is a loop) managed to catch the snake unharmed. We triumphantly transported it to the edge of the village, (and a bit further) where it disappeared into the bushes while hissing and puffing and swearing.

Celebrate with a cloud

To celebrate the successful translocation project, we drank a special Bulgarian cocktail, called облак; cloud. It is a mixture of very cold mastika and a mint liquor, with a little water mixed in for cloudiness. It looks as poisonous as the snake we saved!