Peloponnese 26th of April – 7th of May 2006

Part 5: Pylos - The Western Peninsula

We spent one of our days on the western peninsula in the area of Pylos, searching for water snakes, terrapins and the introduced African chameleon. First of all we searched nearby a river in the village of Rizomylos, where we found only some lizards – P. peloponnesiaca, A. moreoticus and strange green lizards, which showed blue cheeks (but not blue throats). We identified them as Lacerta trilineata, very similar to lizards from the Aegean islands. Eric already knew this "blue" green lizards and believed they are Lacerta viridis but we watched several individuals and definitely identified them as Lacerta trilineata. Unfortunately we could not take tale samples but further research should clear the status of this population.

Our second stop was dedicated to find Chamaeleo africanus and about five minutes after our stop Thomas found two young chameleons in beach shrubs basking in the morning sun. The basilisk chameleon was introduced in ancient times, maybe during the Navarino war in 1827 between a united European armada and the Turkish and Egyptian fleet, which was destroyed in a tough battle and sunk near Pylos.

Hannes found our only alive Elaphe quatuorlineata while searching for chameleons. The juvenile snake was sitting in a bush in about 1 m elevation maybe hunting for chameleons. Another Z. situla were found freshly killed on the road. Other records on this site were L. trilineata (green form), H. gemonensis, T. marginata, T. hermanni, A. moreoticus, P. ridibundus (the distribution limit of P. epeirotica is further north), A. kitaibelii, M. monspessulanus.

On a near channel and along a stream we searched for other herps and found lots of sunbathing Mauremys rivualata and a huge Natrix natrix. Although Eric found some dice snakes in previous excursions we searched in vain for N. tessellata. Emys orbicularis seems to be very rare compared to M. rivulata – we only found few European terrapins in this channel. Also some N. natrix swam to catch tadpoles of H. arborea and P. ridibundus. After the midday heat we went back to search for big chameleons but Hannes could only find another juvenile one and two calling H. arborea sitting in the shrubs. After a very hot but successful day we went back to Karamyli and our Mani stay came to an end…

Part6: The Basin of Feneos

Part4: Taygetos - Mani´s Roof