Snakes removed from habitat prior to major rail engineering work

With major rail engineering work about to start shortly on the eastern shore of Lake Zug, ecologists are duly removing snakes to another nearby habitat to ensure they survive.

These particular snakes are smooth snakes, coronella austriaca to give them their binomial name, of which some hundred are thought to live in the area about to be disturbed. The job of removing them from the area between Walchwil and Lothenbach befalls animal ecologist André Rey (photograph) and his colleague Oliver Seitz. To their delight, one snake they found was 50 centimetres long.

It is five years ago now that Rey was commissioned by the SBB to look at what wildlife lived in the area would be affected by the Zugersee Ost project, not knowing at the time that these non-venomous snakes lived there at all; and they are not easy to find. It was in searching 20 times that the 48-year-old came across 12 specimens, which means a colony of possibly 100. The stone walls in the area are the perfect habitat for them to live, hide and hibernate; they need temperatures of around 20°C to be able to move quickly enough to escape predators.

Not only is the area a habitat for such snakes, other varieties, grass snakes, slow worms, sand and common wall lizards all live there, too. Utmost care will be taken when removing the stones making up the walls as part of the project to rescue any remaining reptiles found there. Alas, in all such major projects, it is inevitable some will perish but great efforts are taken to ensure the number is kept to a minimum. In this case the reptiles are being rehoused a short distance away on the Walchwilerberg where they will be safe, one farmer offering his walls for the purpose.

Before they are released in their new habitat a photograph is taken of the pattern on the snakes’ backs, each one being different, which helps in subsequent checks on them.