The Shieldtail

Non-venomous

‘Arrrrgh’ came the guttural sound from my guide Vagu as he came to a sudden halt in front of a small snake lying on our path. I was in Agumbe, it was the middle of the monsoon and we were heading back from a four kilometer leech infested trek to the summit of a gorgeous waterfall.

Vagu and me had mostly walked in silence as we didn’t have a common language between us. He was a small man but a fast walker. But my ego woudn’t admit that he had superior stamina so I had to constantly come up with subtle excuses to slow him down. I’d grunt just like him and then pretent ot tie a shoe lace, pick leeches off my trousers, or try to photograph a giant squirell already too far away. I’m pretty sure he bought most of them!

Now it was the end of the trip and my legs had turned to jelly. The snake on the road was a pleasant surprise not just because it gave me time to breathe normally again but because it was something I had never seen before. But I already knew what it was from pictures in snake books. It was a Shieldtail. I was estatic!

I sat down on the ground and clicked away with my camera. I was trying my new 50mm prime lens and though it proved a great lens for regular photographs it struggled with the closeups I needed of this tiny reptile. After all I was trying to get pictures of its head which must have been only a couple of milimeters wide!

But even though I knew it was a shieldtail I hadn’t a clue which species it was. So I carried it back with me to the ARRS where I was staying. But even the students there were pretty much in the dark as to what snake it might be. We tried to do a scale count but the snake was too small and kept moving. Even with a magnifying glass it was impossible to identify.

I had to leave immediately after that so I left the snake there. The students told me that Gerry Martin was due to arrive soon after and they were sure he would be able to identify it.

I called up Gerry a couple of days later. ‘I’ve narrowed it down to the genus Rhinophis. But I can’t tell you which species because for that I’d have to euthanize it before I can carry out an accurate scale count’ he said.

Rhinophis was good enough for me. I’ve gone through Whitaker’s book and I see three species listen under the genus Rhinophis: Red-bellied Shieldtail, Cardamom Shieldtail, and Travancore Shieldtail. That’s probably as close as I’ll ever get to knowing what it was!

Shieldtails are very secretive snakes and not much is known about them. They mostly live under moist leaf litter. They get their name from a small armour like scale they have at the tip of their tail. Most probably feed on earthworms and termite larvae.