Bitis rubida, armata and albanica pics

[Pythonodipsas]

The pictures below of B. rubida were taken from other websites and all rights a reserved to the respective owners. The armata and albanica pics are from a buddy in the USA.

CLASSIC B. rubida




Light B. rubida



'Cornuta' Phase B. rubida (note the minimal horns)




Bitis armata for comparision.




Bitis albanica for comparison.



For more pics of armata and albanica go to hank molt's website...globalherpDOTcom

Please will anyone who has, share your pics of these enigmatic species.

[Bushviper]

Hey the pic of the first B. rubida was taken in my lounge. You stole my pic!!!!!!!

No matter, just kidding, I intended posting it anyway.

It is in the gallery of this site too. Just click on Gallery at the top of the page and then go to page 2 of the indigenous venomous.

[Pythonodipsas]

Oops BV. Apolgies.

I collect pics and I have thousands on my machine and I cant always remember where i get them from. Those first pics I thought were John Visser's. Maybe he took them at your house? Or not?

[Bushviper]

Nope I took them with a little Panasonic digicam.

No matter, really, because you said they came from other sites and did not claim them to be yours.

[froot]

Thanks Craig. It's not easy to define the differences between the armata and the rubida from those pics. I figured it the pic in Alexander's thread could be armata because the Cedarberg is only roughly 50km from the coast. The climate on the other hand is vastly different in the Cedarberg not having the typical west coast morning fog. Are the species told apart mainly by the area where they are found?

[Pythonodipsas]

They are partly told apart by area and altitude. Mainly by scale counts and morphology and to a lesser extent pattern. Ventral counts in B. rubida (average 135) are higher than in armata (average 122). Subcaudal counts are also slightly higher. There are aslo differences in other scutellation (labials, horn, etc) I can post this data if you want.

They gave yet to do a mtDNA phylogenetic analysis on the group. That would have interesting results and clarify the situation. I think they are working on one.

The above scuttelation data is taken from:
Branch. W.R. - Dwarf Adders of the Bitis cornuta-inornata complex (Serpentes: Viperidae) in Southern Africa: Copeia - August 1999

[alexander]

Thanks for the pics, do you know where they came from?

[Horned Adder]

Oh my god, thanks for those great pictures mate !! Stunning...

Especially like the rubida where the pics where taken from Tony Phelps. Absolutely awsome - thanx again.

Cheers
Marco

PS: I am still wondering why there aren'r any animals available on the market, caudalis and cornuta are available, why not the same for armata and rubida ?? What's the problem ?? For albanica ok, I know the problem with albanica, so I understand, but have heard so often from people who found armata and rubida in their natural habitats......any thoughts on this ?!?

[Pythonodipsas]

The problem with a lot of guys is they are chasing the money. Now and then people will find armata and rubida but they are sold so quickly overseas (mainly Germany). I think many are scared off by the law as its almost impossible to get 'legal' breeding groups of this species in SA. Once the animals are in Europe or USA they are technically legal.

[Horned Adder]

A question for you Craig:

If I would get some armata and rubida for breeding purposes, and I would have success in breeding them. Would you be allowed to ''buy'' some of the babies from me, as legal Swiss Captive Bred animals ???

How's this technically ?

Thanks for your explanation, unfortunately I have never heard of any armata or rubida that have arrived in Germany or somewhere else in Europe. I only know of one single albanica, that was collected years ago, and is now I a collection of a German snake enthusiast. But in the beginning he didn't even know what he's got, he identified it as Bitis cornuta

Cheers

Marco

[Pythonodipsas]

Well thats what some people have done in this country. I know that Bitis xeropaga has been imported form Europe legally to obtain legal specimens. I am sure if you bred rubida, armata, inornata and albanica you will be my king and I will give even swap my back worm snake (Leptotyphlops) colony for some babies of each!!! Ha Ha

Seriously It should be easy to import CB Dwarf Bitis legally from Europe into this country. Its like Python anchietae, they are Highly illegal here and its impossible to get paperwork....unless you import with paperwork!

[Bushviper]

Pythonadipsas it is technically illegal to import indigenous snakes from overseas. The new Biodiversity Act excludes this unless you can prove that the local genetic pool will not be contaminated by foreign genes.

I know some of the provinces are not aware of this but I would not pin my life savings on some specimens that might be euthanased further down the line.

[Pythonodipsas]

Jeepers! I never knew this.

At some stage I would like to import certain indigenous and would hate for them to be euthenased sometime in the future.

I thought it would be good introduce new gene's into a gene pool. Does it not strengthen the gene?

For example: A brown house snake colony in Welkom wont be hurt by mixing with a escaped house snake captive bred in Germany from Swiss stock. Or am I missing the point?

I think some SA Laws can be so stupid. How silly is that law that if you find an intruder in your house threatening you with a knife, and you shoot him dead, then you could be up for murder charges?

[froot]

Yip, some SA laws are completely devoid of logic. Although, the reasoning I would assume regarding mixing species from different localities is to keep natural bloodlines clean. Although a bhs from Bloem is the same as a bhs from Durban, they are from completely different regoins with different climates (duh!), the evolutionary spreading of a species over that distance may have taken thousands of years and the bloodlines have been seperated for as long. That alone makes it seem like a sin to suddenly mix them again and I suppose one could go as far as to call it 'contamination'. Who knows how different the 2 are but a species with a genetic spacing of such a magnitude must show some subtle differences, physical and behaviourial (sp).

For the pet trade, why not, but definitely not fit for re-introduction.

[Zeek]

Very nice pics
Now i just need someone to clean up the Drool on the floor
They are absolutly Bl@dy amazing