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Xenochrophis piscator

I have often wondered about the common names for species. It turns out that there is no universal governing body for these, so really you can call anything you find anything you like.

I only mention this 'cos i had a problem last night trying to record a snake that i found, but the "database" that had asked me to record it uses a different common name to the one we use here. And then I was completely stumped, when i gave in and it still did not create the record....ah, they said, "you have not put in a hyphen"! Makes me want to slap them three times and hand them to their mummies....or at least just go back to photography and stop trying to record things for scientific databases. ooooops, did i just say that?? I actually believe that the Citizen Science record keeping is a fantastic way for more and more people (especially kids) to get involved, in touch and in love with nature.

Probably the best of these is iNaturalist (search for the APP), but i'll do a full blog on this later on.

Now, the picture above is of a "common" snake, but i have only ever found a few during my many years of looking. The common name is a Checkered Keelback; and young ones and males can have quite a reddish tint to the scales, as seen a little here.

ok, rant over, off for a nice cool one.

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