Adder

[PINNACLE 2,297]

I got this Adder yesterday just before it slipped into a pond

Snake by Martin Billard, on Flickr

[Parabuteos lad 878]

Beautiful Martin

[C.green 3,231]

Thats one of the best pictures ive seen

[CRAZYHORSE 2,647]

Nice work 

[skycat 6,174]

That is incredible: what a chance to get that shot.

[Arry 22,521]

Beautiful photo you must be chuffed with that mate, The timing of it amazing, with the refection and all.

Cheers Arry

[PINNACLE 2,297]

15 hours ago, Arry said:

Beautiful photo you must be chuffed with that mate, The timing of it amazing, with the refection and all.

Cheers Arry

Thanks Arry

I saw it swim across the pond onto a clump of grass so it was just a waiting game after that for it to slip back in and getting it's tongue out was a bonus. So yep pretty chuffed.

[Greyman 29,008]

Absolutely love all your pictures they are fantastic, but may I suggest it may be a grass snake for the following reasons, A it was swimming which grass snakes do were as have never seen an adder swim or even be near water and B the yellow V on the back of its head is the only real way of telling them apart and yours appears to have one, like the one in the picture which I hasten to add I did not take, I looked quite closely at this subject recently when I tried to grab a large adder thinking it was a grass snake, even google gave pictures of the same snake claiming it was both, sorry to be a cock over something so beautiful and rest assured I,m not trying to detract from your wonderful work in any way

[PINNACLE 2,297]

1 hour ago, Greyman said:

Absolutely love all your pictures they are fantastic, but may I suggest it may be a grass snake for the following reasons, A it was swimming which grass snakes do were as have never seen an adder swim or even be near water and B the yellow V on the back of its head is the only real way of telling them apart and yours appears to have one, like the one in the picture which I hasten to add I did not take, I looked quite closely at this subject recently when I tried to grab a large adder thinking it was a grass snake, even google gave pictures of the same snake claiming it was both, sorry to be a cock over something so beautiful and rest assured I,m not trying to detract from your wonderful work in any way

 

Thanks for the comments.

I thought it was a grass snake at first as like you had not seen an adder swim, I was pulled up on this when I posted it on flickr so did a bit more research. https://www.woodlandtrust.org.uk/blog/2018/02/grass-snake-or-adder/ mine does have a v and a zigzag and when I googled adder swimming they can but it is rarer than a grass snake.

Here is a shot before it started to go to the pond where the v is obvious

 

[Gilbey 1,476]

amazing shot, its definitely a adder

[Greyman 29,008]

I,d agree now the head V can be seen as on the grass snake they seem to always be bright yellow regardless of how varied the body markings are, you can see how I almost grabbed the wrong one a few weeks back, thanks again for sharing your pics they are  great and I hope I have,nt offended

[CHEVINFOX 3,537]

Adders have VERTICAL pupils and the Grass Snakes have ROUND pupils

[dytkos 17,821]

They look round, 3 posts up?

Cheers, D.

[neil cooney 10,416]

I'd say that a top professional anywhere in this world would be chuffed to have taken that shot. It's class.