| 1 | Green whipsnake |
Tied with the grass snake as Italy’s most common. This is a 1.5 metre snake, which possesses the power of speed, which it uses to escape any attackers. Green whipsnakes (Hierophis viridiflavus) can reach 6.8mph, and will bite aggressively if cornered. They sometimes raise and shake their tail, thinking they’re a rattlesnake.
The green whipsnake inhabits almost all of Italy, and moves by day. It’s not shy at all, and in warmer coastal areas of Italy, they can be active throughout the entire year. There are many colour variations within Italy, with fully black subpopulations in southern Italy and Sicily. This snake belongs to the 3-strong Hierophis family, the other two members being the Balkan and Cyprus whipsnakes further east.
While green whipsnakes lack traditional venom, a victim who was chewed for 5 minutes straight began to show neurological problems. It transpires that they have a weak rear-fanged venom, like the dice snake. According to an Italian legend, if you find two green whipsnakes mating, you should never say the words “il monaco con la monaca!”. Otherwise, the two snakes will look at you, and instantly charge in a murderous rampage. The phrase translates to “the monk with the nun!”.
| 2 | Aesculapian snake |
The top tree climber of Italian snakes. Aesculapian snakes are mainly found in forests, including the darkest, gloomiest forests which others snakes won’t dare to venture to. They can effortlessly slither up vertical tree trunks, even with no branches to support them. This is a relatively elusive snake, which is sighted by ordinary Italians far less than the green whipsnake.
The Aesculapian snake is non-venomous, and is drenched in ancient history. It was named after the Greek god Asclepius, and was featured in the intricately carved rod he supposedly wielded for healing. 2000 years ago, there were many religious temples featuring these serpents, where patients were made to sleep on a hard floor while “healing” Aesculapian snakes slithered between their legs.
Aesculapian snakes regularly reach 2 metres, and their diet consists of mammals. In a thick forest near Oriolo Romano, their single top prey species was the bank vole, with the black rat second. In a bushy pasture in the Tolfa Mountains near Rome, the house mouse was one of their favourites.
| 3 | Four-lined snake |
Another of Italy’s longest snakes, averaging at 180cm. Four-lined snakes inhabit the southern two thirds of Italy, and are closely related to the Japanese ratsnake out east. This is a non-venomous species, and a particularly calm one even compared to most non-venomous snakes. Four-lined snakes rarely hiss or bite, preferring to stay still and let their camouflage do the work. They’re excellent climbers, skills they use for raiding bird’s nests.
Four-lined snakes appear in forests sometimes, but their heartlands are open areas with an abundance of crumbling rocks, like old stone walls or natural slopes. You won’t find four-lined snakes in a park in central Rome, but you’ll definitely find them in the foundations of an old, abandoned farmhouse.
The diet of the four-lined snake is well documented, as we have a great study from Italy itself. In the Tolfa mountains outside Rome, the composition was 77% mammals and 23% birds. The most common species was the woodmouse. But four-lined snakes also have the serpent superpower of eating eggs. They swallow them whole, and crack them open in their bellies, using specially enlarged vertebrae.
| 4 | Walser viper |
A venomous snake with one of the tiniest ranges in Europe. The Walser viper was long believed to be an adder subspecies, but separated into its own (Vipera walser) in 2016. It lives in Piedmont, in a small mountainous area north of the Italian alpine town of Biella. There are two populations, a northern one encompassing 45 square kilometres, and a southern population encompassing 225km². Walser’s viper lives at an average altitude of 1600 metres, and loves to bask on warm rocks on their mountainous slopes.
Genetic analysis showed that this viper was most closely related to the Caucasus viper of Turkey. Despite a similar appearance, it was merely a distant cousin of the adder, and was closer to Italy’s meadow viper on the evolutionary tree.
Being such a recent discovery, there are no Walser viper bites on record, although they’ve almost certainly happened. The 2016 discovery study found a low genetic diversity, and recommended that they be listed as endangered. With Europe so industrialised and fully explored, nobody expected to discover a new viper in 2016.
| 5 | Grass snake |
Europe’s most common snake, which is abundant all over Italy. Grass snakes aren’t aquatic, but are generally found near streams or ponds. They’re fantastic swimmers which zip along like a speedboat, and can rest on floating lily pads. On land, they move far more slowly. This is a non-venomous snake which defaults to playing dead for its survival.
The grass snake is commonly found near villages, as its survival strategy involves laying eggs in compost heaps. With such a vast territory, the grass snake has different favourite meals by location. One study examined Marcigliana in the Mediterranean region of central Italy. It found that mammals and amphibians were their favourite, and that the top two species were common toads (bufo bufo) and the Savi’s pine vole (Microtus savii), which was extremely common nearby.
Italy has several grass snake subspecies, one being Natrix natrix cetti. This lives exclusively on Sardinia, prefers watery environments, and sometimes has a bluish colour. These days, the species is under confusion, as those in Italy may actually be the barred grass snake (Natrix helvetica), like the English colonies which were also reassigned.
| 6 | Javelin boa |
Probably the rarest snake in Italy. This 80cm snake is closely related to the Arabian sand boa, and is short and thick with a stumpy tail. It’s native to Turkey, Greek, southeast Europe and the Middle East, and hadn’t been sighted in Italy since the 1930s. That all changed in 2015, when both live and roadkilled javelin boas were officially confirmed in Licata, southern Sicily. Javelin boas inhabit nowhere else in Italy, just a tiny slice of this large southern island.
This species is notorious for Ancient Greeks hurling them towards their enemies as javelins in battles, to inspire terror. Some say this inspired the name, but others say it comes from their hunting style. Javelin boas like to bury themselves in loose soil, and launch themselves out when prey pass, in an explosive display of speed. Nobody is sure whether the javelin boa is native to Italy, or was introduced centuries ago by conquering Greeks. One study tested the Sicily javelin boa population, and found a diet of 71.4% mammals by headcount. Reptiles and reptile eggs were also on the menu.
| 7 | Southern smooth snake |
A shy and elusive snake. Coronella girondica has a maximum length of 86cm, and is usually much smaller. False smooth snakes are missing from the southern half of Italy, and are most common in the northwest. They’re found in the northeast as well, but only in scattered records. They’re most common in open areas, including rocky plains, pastureland, plantations, and Mediterranean shrubland. They also inhabit Spain and north Africa.
Southern smooth snakes lack venom. Instead, they survive by copying venomous snakes; they press their head against the ground, coil up, make a snorting sound, then throw their head up as though preparing to bite. Their pattern spacing is similar to the deadly asp viper, a process called Batesian mimicry. Their eyes are a gold colour, and they have a dark line stretching from each eye to the corner of their mouth.
Most of their diet consists of reptiles, with their single favourite prey in Italy being the common wall lizard (Podarcis muralis). Compared to in Spain, southern smooth snakes in Italy eat significantly more millipedes and centipedes.
| 8 | Leopard snake |
The leopard snake, AKA European ratsnake, is primarily a snake of southeast Europe, particularly Greece. However, it has natural colonies along the southeast coast of Italy, including southeast Sicily and Puglia.
This Italian snake is one of the most comfortable in manmade environments. These include olive and citrus groves, parks, suburban gardens, and even towns. They’re known to lurk discreetly in the historic old city parts of Catonia. In the countryside, they prefer open areas like scrubland and coastal hilly areas. This is a constrictor that mostly eats mammals, like the Aesculapian snake it is closely related to. At 70-100cm, leopard snakes are far smaller than their cousin.
Leopard snakes have several morphs in Italy: a striped version, a patched version, and an in-between version. Originally, they were divided into subspecies based on these patterns, but they were recently lumped together again. The leopard snake is just a single subspecies with superficial morphs, like the eyelash viper. The striped morph is particularly common along the Adriatic coast of Puglia.
| 9 | Dice snake |
Italy’s fishiest snake. The dice snake (Natrix tessellata) is a relative of the grass snake (Natrix helvetica), but even more water-dwelling. The dice snake can spend hours underwater in the slow-moving rivers it favours, surfacing only to take a 2 second breath. In optimal conditions, this snake can swell to vast numbers, with thousands per lake.
Dice snakes measure 1-1.2 metres, and are most active in the afternoon. Compared to their cousin, they’re much more heavily reliant on fish. In a stream called Fosso Verginese in a hilly region of central Italy, 97% of the dice snake’s meals were fish, compared to just 17% for grass snakes.
Dice snakes are highly reliant on vision for hunting, as scent molecules are dispersed and hard to track in water. Rather than venom or constriction, dice snakes simply grab their prey and force them down. That prey doesn’t include human beings, as dice snakes almost never bite. Like the grass snake, they love to play dead, and they sometimes fill their mouths with blood to complete the act.
| 10 | Asp viper |
Easily the most common venomous snake in Italy. Asp vipers are estimated to cause 90% of fatal snakebites in Italy. They measure 40-85cm and have an upturned nose, and prefer sheltered areas such as thickets and hedges.
The asp viper has 5 subspecies across Europe, and Italy hosts 3, the main one being Vipera aspis francisciredi. This has a very swollen head compared to the French subspecies, particularly behind the eyes, like someone’s inflated them with a bicycle pump. Sicily hosts Vipera aspis hugyi, which has circular dark marks, while the far north is the realm of Vipera aspis astra. This version has unusually thick dark bars. Despite the danger, asp vipers aren’t aggressive. They slither slowly, and will only turn nasty if you harass or pick them up.
Another Italian statistic came from the Poison Control Centre of Milan, stating that 21% of dogs bitten by asp vipers didn’t survive. In a study from the Tolfa mountains of central Italy, mammals comprised 81.4% of the asp viper’s diet. The top species were the common shrew (Sorex araneus) and house mouse (mus musculus). This differs to France, where they’re largely vole addicts, sometimes up to 90% of meals.
Further north in Italy, Vipera aspis astra was obsessed with the Savii’s pine vole. They also ate the lesser white-toothed shrew (Crocidura suaveolens), but in smaller quantities, despite being more common locally. The asp vipers ignored two other small mammals which were available: the wood mouse and striped field mouse.