ak. The snake evening on Wednesday 23. August 2006 at the Scientific Society of Windhoek, started with a very interesting film about snakes of Namibia in general and the impressing work of Helmut Finkeldey, who has spotted six new sorts of cobras in Namibia and publicised numerous scientific papers about the 60 sorts of snakes being found in Namibia. A particular interest of the film concerns Spitting Cobras, which are the most frequent snakes found in Namibia and also very dangerous. Until today no serum was found against their poison. Typical is their upstanding offensive position which enables them to spit their poison in the eyes of an enemy, thus the foe can go blind. The film also emphasized the artistic survivors, which are living in the harshness of the Pre-Namib. In this vast region, animals and plants have developed a lot of fascinating characteristics which enable them to survive. One impressive example in the film was the Horned Adder, which incessantly changes its supporting surface while crawling forward. By doing this, the Horned Adder absorbs only a minimum of soil temperature. Similarly to this, also the Sidewinder, which is frequently found in dunes, always varies its supporting surface. The Sidewinder crawls sideways to the sand as the name implies. It is searching slack points in the sand where it can hide under the sand, because its not possible for this snake to stay for a long time on the hot sand which at times reaches 67 degrees. In this fascinating overview about the snakes in Namibia, the Rock Python, the biggest snake of Namibia was also not missing. The Rock Python is a non-toxic giant and can be up to 5 meters long. All snakes in Namibia are protected animals. This is particularly true for the non-toxic giant snakes, to which also the Dwarf Python belongs, as Helmut Finkeldey stressed in this film. He is called out up to 80 times a year for collecting snakes, which he abandons at favourable places in the bush without charging any money.

Puff Adders, the most widespread sort of snakes in Africa, characterized by their triangular formed head, which is typical for the family of vipers, were of particular interest in the following speech of Heiner Mittendorf. Most central was the live-birth of Puff Adders. Live-birth is a charac-teristic of all Vipers and thus unique for snakes which normally lay eggs. Mittendorf reported about three coitus, pregnancies and births of a pair of Puff Adders which lived together in a terrarium at his home and the following exciting experiences with all in all 62 little snakes, which are self-contained immediately after birth.

Snakes don’t lie above rocks, bushes or bark and wait aggressively until a human being crosses the way for biting. They normally don’t want to be evil to human beings. This was the main message of the evening. They often come near to the houses or gardens, because there they will find food. Especially gnawers, like mice which are quite often a prefered food of snakes, will be lured by food waste of human beings, thus the snakes follows the spoor of their food. But even if less than ¼ of the 60 sorts of snakes in Namibia are harmless to humans, one should never loose respect of this animals, as Heiner Mittendorf emphasized at the end of his speech. He proposed to introduce a snake-license, similar to a drivers license for cars and said that he is willing to prepare interested people for this license.

General facts and personal experiences of Helmut Finkeldey and Heiner Mittendorf about snakebites, natural behaviour of snakes or the everyday live with Puff Adders in the house of Mittendorf should quieten the snake phobia of many people. All in all both presentations were really fascinating and instructive. But the question remains if some stories about being impatient of snake serum, starch fingers and serious injuries of a dog fully support the concern to quieten the fear against snakes.

If you like to gain more information about snakes in Namibia, refer to the book published by the Scientific Society of Namibia: „Snakes of Namibia", which is available in English, Afrikaans and German.