17/11/2023
Early October a team of herpetologists published a revised checklist of the reptiles of Indochina (Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, and Thailand). In this major work, the following two first records of 2 snake species for Thailand were made official. We can finally share the images with you! But there's quite a story behind these discoveries. Too long for a Facebook post, but I post it anyway, haha.
Some of you may remember the post about our Malayan Tapir sighting, last year. After quite a few days of studying google maps and surveying the still largely unexplored forests of the deep south of Thailand on the border with Malaysia, my friend and I managed to find our way to a high elevation area. Heavily packed with hammocks, sleeping bags, food, a water filtration system, camera gear, and a lot of batteries and flashlights, we ascended the mountain. Crossing streams and following elephant & tapir tracks on mountain ridges. We photographed birds that had not been photographed on Thai soil before, we found lizards and frogs that virtually nobody had seen before in Thailand, and then there was the amazing tapir sighting posing 10m from my hammock after our first night up there.
After returning to civilisation with our stories, several friends got excited about our exploration and findings. So, we decided to plan a longer expedition with a highly skilled team consisting of herpetologists, an entomologist and several ornithologists. Unlike our first trip, we decided to cut the long rough hike in two and spend a night at about 950m elevation to explore some streams where on our previous surveys we had found a couple interesting frogs. That night the elephants were foraging in the bamboo forest a bit too close for comfort. We didn't get much sleep. But the frogs were found.
The next day we packed up camp and hiked to our main destination, the 'tapir camp' at 1400m elevation. The group had not quite anticipated how tough this hike was. But they all made it up there, though promising to themselves that they would never do this again, haha.
We spend 3 nights at the highest camp. The birders were out early each morning, the herpers and entomologist were out till late each night. All excited to discover the unknown. One of us was not feeling too well, but pushed through anyway. That later turned out to be a Covid infection. But it was all worth it.
On the first night up there, I stumbled upon a tiny banded, orangish 'worm' coiled up on a tree fern leaf in the humid mossy forest. It was the first truly exciting find. A snake species known from the highlands in Malaysia but that had never been recorded in Thailand before. This little gem was clearly a newborn, still waiting for its first shed. Later I found another juvi almost certainly from the same parent around the same tree. And one and a half hour later I spotted an adult cruising 3m above the ground in a tree. The species is known as the Mirkwood Forest Slug Snake (Asthenodipsas lasgalenensis). A totally harmless highland specialist species that like all the other snail-eaters never bites. We were all exploring in separate ways. When we met up, it turned out my friend had also found the same slug snake species. We found 8 in total that trip.
Each day we would filter water close to the source of a small stream in a little valley near our camp. One day, one of the birders went to this water source and as he kneeled down, he noticed a tiny brown snake on the forest floor. This turned out to be another exciting find. Another new species for Thailand, previously only known from Malaysia. The Chan-ard's Reed Snake (Macrocalamus chanardi) named after the Thai herpetologist Tanya Chan-ard.
What a trip! Finding a new country record is hard enough, finding two in a single trip, is pretty amazing!
But the story got even more exciting on the day that we were leaving. The 3 birders started the descend earlier in the morning than originally planned. They had a GPS device and recorded the trail on the way up, so they were likely going to be fine. If they would be in doubt which way they had to go, they told us they would wait for us to catch up. We herpers typically don't wake up too early...
One of the herpers and the entomologist had packed up all their stuff before me and my other friend. So, they decided to start descending too. And an hour or so later my friend and I were the last ones to leave the camp.
Roughly half way on the way to our camp location of the first night, we met up with the 3 birders. They were taking it slow, but were doing fine. When we asked if they had seen the other two guys they confirmed they had passed them and were walking faster so decided to continue by themselves. We knew they did not have a record of the GPS track. It was a bit worrying to hear that they were on their own.
The birders were doing fine with their GPS device, so we decided to go ahead of them and hopefully catch up with the other two guys before they would take a wrong turn. We agreed with the birders that we would wait at the camp location of our first night. But when we reached the camp, there was no sign of our other two friends. They had left some stuff behind on the first night, and the stuff was still there so we knew they had not arrived yet.
That's when we started to get really worried. We were in a huge forest complex. And especially if they had taken a wrong turn off on the wrong side of the ridge, they would end up in 'endless' forest which would be hard to ever find your way out. We waited for the birders till they reached camp. But still no sign of our 2 friends. We decided to wait a bit longer but if no sign of them in the next hour, then we had to take further action. The hour passed, but there was still no sign of them. We decided that my friend and the 3 birders would continue the hike out of the forest to make sure they would be in an area with phone reception. And I decided to hike alone back up the mountain to look for our 2 friends. With a stick I hit on the bamboo to make as much noise as possible, hoping they would hear me. And I regularly shouted their names. I hiked a couple kilometers back but there was no sign of them. And that's when the heavens broke and it started pouring heavily. It was late afternoon, with only an hour or so of light left. They would never hear me in this heavy rain, so I gave up, turned around to continue my walk out of the forest. At camp 1 I picked up my big backpack. By that time it was already dark, raining heavily, and I started descending down the slippery muddy trail that had turned into a stream. I was praying there would not be any elephants, because I wouldn't be able to hear or see them unless I would literally bump into them. But mostly I was very worried about my 2 friends still out there in the forest. Not knowing if they would have enough battery power for their flashlights, and if they had any battery power left in their phone in case they would find a spot with mobile reception. I felt responsible, but tried to comfort myself with the thought that both of them have extensive experience in the Thai jungles.
Later that evening when I got out of the forest and had phone reception to call my friend to pick me up. I had to share the bad news that I had failed to find them. We discussed our plan for the next day. Obviously we would have to go back into the forest to look for them. In the meantime we happened to be chatting to a villager. We had not even told him yet that our friends were lost, but coincidentally he started telling stories of locals that had been lost in the forest. In some cases up to 20! days. And those were people that 'knew' the area. Not exactly a cheerful thought. There was nothing more we could do besides getting some rest after the long rough day.
But sure enough when I was back in my room, later that night my phone rang and the name of my lost friend showed on the screen. I picked up the phone and was very happy to hear their voice. It turned out they still had some battery power left and with the GPS function on the phone they had started walking in the direction of the nearest road. At that stage they had probably been hiking continuously for 12 hrs or so, with their big backpacks. Off trail hiking up and down mountains but finally they had reached a mountain ridge where they had phone reception.
We figured out where they would roughly exit the forest. So I drove down to that area, and started driving up and down the road until I noticed a light coming down from on of the forested slopes.
At 1:00AM they finally reached the road. Totally exhausted. But it was great to see them again. The next morning a test confirmed one of them had Covid. And sure enough a day later 2 other group members tested positive too.
But we found two new snakes for Thailand! And heard interesting bird calls that suggested new country records, and new frogs and lizards, butterflies, and other insects for Thailand.
What an adventure!
😍
https://tontantravel.com/
