Keep Hyderabad’s slithery visitors at bay in summer

Hyderabad: With temperatures soaring, the city’s slithery creatures are coming out of their burrows, making snake sightings an increasingly frequent affair. The Friends of Snakes Society (FOSS), an NGO working for conservation of snakes in India rescued around 600 snakes in February, with the number going up to 800 by March. “In April too, more […]

Hyderabad: With temperatures soaring, the city’s slithery creatures are coming out of their burrows, making snake sightings an increasingly frequent affair.

The Friends of Snakes Society (FOSS), an NGO working for conservation of snakes in India rescued around 600 snakes in February, with the number going up to 800 by March.

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“In April too, more than 800 snakes were rescued. In April and May, due to the rise in temperatures, more snakes were rescued compared to February. In addition to this, these months are the breeding period for two snake species,” said Avinash Viswanathan, General Secretary, FOSS.

The Indian cobra also known as spectacled cobra and the rat snake are the two species that breed during these months.

It’s not only on the city outskirts that snakes were rescued. Several of them were rescued from densely populated areas in the city. FOSS members said the number of SOS calls would gradually drop after the second week of May.

“Temperature is an indicator for snakes to breed. As soon as the temperature increases by the end of February, the breeding period of the cobra starts and continues for over a month and in April, the breeding period of rat snakes commences and continues for a month. By the mid of May, with the temperatures becoming too high and the breeding period coming to an end, the number of rescue operations come down,” said Avinash.

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