Cute, Friendly, and Often Mistaken to be Deadly – Issue #102

Fangless and harmless speedy beauties

This past week a friend called me to ask me about a snake that he was looking at, and wanted to know what it is. Turns out that it is one of the species that are often mistaken, for their very venomous look alike, and yet there are clear and stark differences.
I had the opportunity to photograph the beautiful snake my friend caught; a Spotted Bush Snake (Philothamnus semivariegatus). While the accepted common name is the Spotted Bush Snake, it is also often called a Spotted Green Bush Snake. These beautiful snakes are arboreal predators that prey on geckos, small frogs, nestling birds and when the opportunity presents itself, chameleons.
Spotted Bush Snakes do not have any venom, and do not possess fangs. However, they have been shown to have toxins in their saliva, but the toxins have no effect on humans. Furthermore, they have binocular vision, meaning they have forward facing eyes that let them see like we do.

The Spotted Bush snake, however, is often mistaken for a Boomslang (Dispholidus typus) and are wrongfully killed, as they were thought to be the venomous counterpart. The confusion comes in at the fact that both the Boomslang and the Spotted Bush Snake are both green, have large eyes, and live in trees. Spotted bush snakes hatch green, with black dots on their thin long body, while Boomslang are either brown, black, or green, and they only turn green when they are around 70cm in length. Also, the Boomslang has a thicker body with keeled scales, making it look rough, while the Spotted Bush Snake has smooth overlapping scales.

The Spotted Bush Snake I photographed was very friendly and had no issues working with me. However, when they feel threatened or cornered, they will not hesitate to inflate their throats and bite, but their bite is harmless to humans.

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