Cute liitle snake.

Markit

The default for most Balinese confrontations with snakes seems to be - beat it to death and claim it was poisonous. This makes the tree-huggers go berserk but does have a certain logic when identifying danger is difficult. I've tried looking up all the snakes that wander into my grounds over the years with very mixed results. Even using the various guides issued by the local snake friends and all source on the web. Fact is snakes look about as much like their indentikit pix as criminal do - not very. In light of that I've given up trying to ID them and now [B]all[/B] snakes are given a stern talking to not to come back and gently and caringly put over the wall and back into the paddy fields from whence they came. I figure there's room for all of us here.

mugwump

That spitting cobra at Medewi had to be a tourist as living in the area for 10 years have never seen nor heard of any that close to the sea. Perhaps your libation had transformed it.

Steve Rossell

I'll rustle up the photo mugwump, if I can find it and post it for you. I'm not discounting the tourist or libation theories though. It was actually on the sand making its way toward a coconut grove very sluggishly, until it got to dirt and with new found purchase took off like the proverbial. I made sure that I stayed behind the way it was heading. It certainly weren't no sea snake and I agree, I thought it unusual to see a land snake on the beach. Markit, I agree with you and the field workers. Why take a chance when whatever snake it is might end up in your field and ruining your day? Understandable .

Steve Rossell

A week ago I was making a sandwich in the open, under cover, kitchen of my new digs. The kitchen is adjacent to the canal that in turn feeds the rice fields that are my view which is framed by some vines. I noticed a smallish, thin vivid green snake amongst the vines, it looked as though it had evolved to mimic the green stems of the vine and I made a mental note to take a photo of the cute little snake next time I saw it. A couple of days later there was an almighty commotion from the rice field workers as they were carrying out some maintenance of the canal banks and it's tributaries. I looked up from my book (luddite ref') and they were in a great state of agitation pointing to the bank. I saw a vivid green little snake making its way out of the water and into the undergrowth, it was maybe 1/2 a metre long and seemed as thick as one of my fingers. One of them grabbed a long, long stick flushed it into the open and beat it to death. Once dead everyone still kept a good distance and the long stick was used to lift it onto a pathway and then the critter was beaten into post death into several reincarnations later. After noticing the reddish tail that melded with the vivid green body I looked up Bali snakes and am still undecided as to whether it may have been a juvenile pit viper or another less venomous slitherer as it didn't seem to fit the 'thick bodied' description that I'd read about. I grew up in Oz and am not afraid of snakes but I don't go getting all 'Steve Irwin' on them either, although I did get a nice shot of what turned out to be a spitting cobra up Medewi a while ago. Any snake charmers out there?

JohnnyCool

There are, indeed, cobras in West Bali, or at least there used to be. There were even some on Kuta Beach occasionally (the Tuban area) in the 1970s.

Markit

We get lots of cobra here in the east. Place is literally teeming with them. All those that can't outrun an angry pit viper or cobra should stay well to the south.

Steve Rossell

[ATTACH]2488.vB[/ATTACH] Close to Medewi. As you can see it ain't no sea snake.

Markit

I think that's what they call a Jali here but a cobra looks real similar until is spreads its hood.

mugwump

[b]ular carabao[/b]

Steve Rossell wrote[ATTACH=CONFIG]2488[/ATTACH] Close to Medewi. As you can see it ain't no sea snake.

Making no claims as a herpetologist still don't think what you depict is a cobra. It looks more like what the locals call ular carabao. Did you see it near Medewi Retreat or Medewi Beach? These sites are separated by several kilometers and was curious. Ular carabao is not considered poisonous.

Steve Rossell

I'm no herpetologist either mugwump and I've never contracted it either :D. If I remember correctly it was closer to a resort that was south of Medewi point and over another river. If this works I'll post a few photo's that I took just after the snake shot and as I headed toward Medewi itself.[ATTACH]2492.vB[/ATTACH][ATTACH]2493.vB[/ATTACH][ATTACH]2495.vB[/ATTACH], complete with border protection.[ATTACH]2494.vB[/ATTACH]

mugwump

The pictures are near a hotel named Puri Da Juma which is just east of the boat launch site.