Snakes, Lizards and Amphibians in Dorset

~ judyheiser

All six species of British native reptile can be found in Dorset and this week we spent three days searching for them. We were also looking for the six native amphibians that are in Dorset, as well as two established populations of non-native lizards – it was a very full few days.

The beautiful and historic village of Corfe Castle in Dorset

This was another Naturetrek holiday and several expert herpetologists (amphibian and reptile experts) from the Amphibian and Reptile Conservation Trust (ARC Trust) were our guides for the next few days.

We all met up at Mortons Manor in Corfe Castle at 3.30pm on Monday for an introduction, but in no time at all we were off to Creech Heath, one of the eighty reserves that the ARC Trust own or manage for ‘herps’ in Dorset and Surrey.

All the ARC Trust reserves we visited had tins down which are often used by cold-blooded reptiles to warm up under and are vital for surveying

On this first reserve we found four smooth snakes, Coronella austriaca, sheltering under the tins. By the end of our time in Dorset, we had found over fifteen of them:

A smooth snake. These snakes rarely bask out in the open and so looking under the tins was a really good way to find them. They can grow to 60-70cm in length but are non-venomous, feeding mainly on common lizards, slow worms and small mammals
Gary from the ARC Trust, who has a licence to disturb and handle these endangered snakes, showing us a smooth snake in more detail. This is Britain’s rarest snake which is now only found in mature heathland in Dorset, Hampshire and a few sites in Surrey
The patterning on their head and neck is different for every snake and can be used to identify individuals
Dave holding a smooth snake under Gary’s watchful eye. The scales do not have a raised keel on them and so the snake does indeed feel smooth

We also found a grass snake, Natrix helvetica, under one of the tins:

Grass snakes can grow to well over a metre. They are also non-venomous and amphibians form a staple part of their diet although they do eat small mammals, birds and eggs as well. They are our only egg-laying snake – ten to forty soft-shelled eggs are laid in June or July in rotting vegetation
The amazing underside of a grass snake. The snake emitted a strong and unpleasant smell which I understand is difficult to wash off

The third British snake species is the adder. These are sometimes found warming up under tins, but more often are to be found basking out in the open. Despite turning over so many tins in the numerous ARC Trust reserves we visited, as well as being taught where to look for them basking, we failed to see an adder during this holiday. We were assured, however, that they were definitely around but just keeping out of our way.

An adder, Vipera berus, from Wiki Commons. Photo by wikipedysta Astrum (Mirella Liszka) under CCA-SA2.5. The adder is the UK’s only venomous snake and it likes open habitats on free draining soils like chalk or sand. They grow up to 60cm and feed largely on small rodents and lizards

After dinner on the first day we went off on a trip to look for natterjack toads in the dark. However, we were scuppered by the weather – it had been so hot and dry that all the toads had buried themselves away in the soil.

A natterjack toad, Epidalea calamita, photo from Wiki Commons. Photo by Bernard Dupont under CCA-SA2.0. These toads are very rare in the UK and the ARC Trust is doing a lot of conservation work to try to help them. They live in sand dunes and sandy heaths and breed in shallow, ephemeral pools of water

We did, however, see natterjack tadpoles which was something:

Looking at natterjack tadpoles in a shallow, concrete-lined pool that the ARC Trust has built to improve natterjack toad breeding success

The morning of the second day of the holiday was spent visiting a large ARC Trust reserve called Parley Common. It was here that we got our first glimpse of a sand lizard:

This is a female sand lizard and is recognisable by those eye spots down her flank. Sand lizards, Lacerta agilisare, another critically endangered species, are primarily found in heathland and dunes in Dorset, Surrey and Hampshire. There have, however, been several attempted reintroductions into other suitable areas such as at Sandwich Bay in our home county of Kent and I understand that this population is still hanging on
We saw male sand lizards as well over the course of the trip and these are amazing looking things
A classic D-shaped sand lizard burrow in the compacted sand with evidence of activity outside

The sloughed skin of a smooth snake was found under one of the tins at Parley Common.

As the snake increases in size, it repeatedly needs to shed its old skin and regrow a larger one. The animal is very vulnerable to predation whilst this process is going on and often chooses to do it under the protection of a tin

We found a smooth snake that was about to shed its skin. We knew this because its eyes were milky – the skin is shed from the entire length of the animal including its eyes which go milky as the skin slowly detaches itself before shedding:

There was a dead grass snake under one of the tins:

No cause of death was apparent

Although the snake was only very recently dead, a sexton beetle, Nicrophorus vespillo, had already arrived and will now start to bury the corpse and lay its eggs on it so that its larvae will have a safe food source.

A sexton beetle, one of nature’s recyclers

I know that this is not a very good photo of a Dartford warbler but it’s the best I got and does show its amazing red eye:

We saw several of these heathland-specialist birds

Scarce chaser dragonflies were seen at Parley Common:

Dave’s photo of an immature scarce chaser. Particularly noticeable is the yellow veining on the wings and the beautiful brown eyes, but they often also have black tips to their wings as here. These dragonflies are red listed but have been expanding their range of late, which is good news

In the afternoon we drove to the seaside at Boscombe, a busy suburb of Bournemouth and really quite urban. We were there to see two non-native lizard populations: western green lizards, Lacerta bilineata, and wall lizards, Podarcis muralis.

We did see a western green lizard on the clifftop, but this is definitely not one of my better photos. As I was trying to switch my camera to manual focus to stop the camera focusing on the grass, the lizard moved off:

However, we did see these lizards in La Brenne in central France a few years ago. The male is on the left and the female on the right:

The female has lost her tail at some point and regrown a stubby new one made of cartilage. Apparently these lizards store quite a lot of fat reserves in their tails and this might well have been a big problem for her later in the year as she tried to put on sufficient fat to hibernate.

We saw lots of wall lizards as we descended the zigzag path down Portman Ravine onto the beach:

These lizards have really long tails. They are native to the Channel Islands but not technically to mainland Britain.
This was a really green individual

We stood for a while watching a male trying to interest a female by biting her:

It had been a very long day and we got back to Mortons Manor not much before 7pm. After dinner, we were back out again in the dark to try to see the three native species of newt: smooth, palmate and great crested.

We visited the Green Pool, part of another ARC Trust reserve. After an exceptionally dry spring, the water level was very low which made newt-hunting tricky.

They were not able to catch much from the banks of the pool so they waded in:

There were a lot of water scorpions in the water:

I hadn’t seen one of these before. These predators walk around the bottom of the pond and hide amongst dead vegetation to ambush prey such as tadpoles and newtlets.

We did eventually find all three species of newt in this one pool. Here is a young great crested newt:

Last October we had a better view of a great crested newt when we rescued one that was stuck in a bucket in our daughter’s garden:

We had three amphibian experts with us at Green Pool but all three of them were completely flummoxed by this next newt:

This is a full sized newt yet still has its external gills and has some of the markings of all three newt species. None of them had seen anything like it before and it was taken back to the ARC Trust headquarters to be properly photographed before being returned to the pool the next day

We got back to the hotel at around 11.30pm. Naturetrek holidays are always pretty full-on but this one was on another level with the addition of the after-dinner trips out in the dark to spot amphibians.

On the last day of the holiday it was gently raining but we visited two more ARC Trust reserves. More smooth snakes were found at Great Ovens reserve as well as our first slow worm of the trip:

We were pleased to have eventually seen a slow worm
Male slow worm

The great fox-spider, Alopecosa fabrilis, has recently been rediscovered at Great Ovens reserve. This is one of the UK’s largest and most endangered spider species that hadn’t been seen anywhere in the country for nearly twenty years and was feared extinct.

Great Ovens reserve where great fox spiders have recently been found chasing down their prey in the dark. The largest females have a leg span of 5cm

Rhododendron is absolutely beautiful at this time of year but is actually an invasive nightmare:

Gorse can also be a real problem as well because it just does too well in heathland habitats and is difficult to control. In our final reserve at Lytchett Bay, some of the gorse was covered in webbing made by the red gorse mite, Tetranychus lintearius. This tiny spider mite lives in colonies on the gorse protected by spun silk webs and it is hoped that they can eventually be used as a biological control:

Gorse covered in the webbing of the red gorse mite

We were delivered back to the hotel at 4pm, before starting our drive back to Kent. Over the course of our short herpetological holiday in Dorset we had learned so much from the lovely ARC Trust experts who are working hard to conserve and promote British reptiles and amphibians. In just three days our group had seen five of the six British native reptiles (we never did see an adder), and two additional bonus species of non-native reptiles. We had also seen five of the seven native species of amphibian, just missing the common frog and the pool frog that is not found in Dorset. We had also been introduced to several great ARC Trust reserves that we will certainly be returning to in the future to see if we can finally spot that elusive adder basking in the sunshine.

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