UKH

I saw an adder today in Boreraig on Skye

I had nipped behind a wall for a pee and just as I was undoing my trousers, I noticed it where I was planning to pee! Glad I did! Lol

It was quite small, so presumably a youngster. Cool wee creature and only the second time I have seen one! 

Would be interesting to hear the adders version of events 😊

Ha ha!

A few years ago, after climbing 'Blank' on the South Slabs in Glen Rosa, with my father, I stopped for a swim in a pool on the walk out while Dad walked on.

After getting out and starting to dry off, I noticed that I had been swimming with a companion:

http://www.ootnaboot.scot/summer2015/20150610Swimming_Adder.jpg

It was cold and lethargic and caught going round and round in an eddy, apparently unable to get out, so I fished it out with a stick and placed it on a warm bit of granite. To start with, it wouldn't move, but as it warmed it started perking up, until it decided it wasn't too sure about me:

http://www.ootnaboot.scot/summer2015/20150610Basking_Adder.jpg

I'm glad it hadn't been so energetic while I was swimming with it!

I left it to its business and headed off to catch up with Dad and get the ferry home.

Amazing! Good job you were there to fish it out!

A friend of mine got bitten by an adder while she was having a pee!

I am sure you all know the You're going to die story!

Do tell.

Also of course there is a certain irony in calling the poor fella “a cool wee creature” as he was about to be exactly that .😁

You should have had it away - would be an excellent rat deterrent...

That did occur to me! 

Adders are dying out you know.

Why? 

They can't multiply.

I've tended to see one roughly every three or four years, maybe ten or so all told, although I've never been to Jura and haven't been on Arran for ages, both of which places would likely boost the total. Most recent sighting was a fine wriggly young one on a track on the Ballochbuie side of Lochnagar three summers ago.

A friend has twice been bitten, although he's in the habit of picking them up, which probably isn't the best idea. Closest I've come to a bite was on a warm spring day 30 years ago on the obscure side of Meall Chuaich after a camp in Glen Tromie. Hard work with warm sun, soft snow patches and a big rucksack, and at some point a long way from anywhere I crossed a small burn and pulled myself up a steep heathery bank to get on a deer track. Plonked a hand on the path above my head and there was sudden movement - my hand was maybe six inches from two drowsy adders curled up together in the sunshine. They shot off sideways in an instant and I got up the rest of the steep bank almost as quickly, and on we all went - but had I put my hand only slightly to the side they would surely (and entirely reasonably) have bitten it, which could have had quite serious consequences given that I was at least a couple of hours from the nearest road.

I'm not surprised - it's pretty rude to bother an adder while she's peeing.

Glen Tromie seems to be great for them.

I just about cycled over this one, there, and I saw two more later in the day:

http://www.ootnaboot.scot/summer2007/20070804Adder.JPG

When I was 10 we were in Sweden, on some lake beach. I needed a wee and went over to some rocks, and thought it would be fun to hose the full length of the little stick that was on the rock.

Stick moved.

Diluted squealed like a little girl.

Since then I've seen them loads at Harrisons, Froggatt, Curbar etc. And watched some for ages on Big Moor, they are really quite exquisite if you are lucky enough to get quite close without distressing them.

Saw one in Glen Sannox on my first climbing trip to Arran in 2002.

Didn't see another until this past April coming down Garbh Allt just before the kissing gate above the Glen Rosa path. Saw another one another 15 feet further on inside the gate -- when it rains ...

Adders are very common in my neck of the woods. I see one or two a year, particularly on the Weald. Had a very similar experience to you a few years ago when I stopped and sat on a pile of logs to eat my sandwiches. Suddenly I heard a rustling of leaves below me and looked down to see an adder slither out between my legs from within the pile. I've also seen adders swimming across woodland ponds. They are fast!

There is village nearby called Netherfield which I am told was originally called Adderfield in the Doomsday book because of the large number of adders there.

As an aside apparently adder bites are very rare in the UK, and deaths from adder bites even rarer. You are more likely to be fatally stung by a wasp or hornet, and that's rare enough.

Netherfield does indeed derive from Nadderfield,  which in turn comes from the very old English Naedre for serpent.  Derivations include Natter, from the German, as in Natterjack toad (serpentine marked).   I had a good friend whose grandparents lived in Netherfield and we often used to go and look for snakes, though we never found any.

The Welsh for snake is neidr, the plural being nadroedd. The Latin for the Grass Snake is Natrix helvetica.

I've been stung by two wasps this summer, and only seen one adder this year at Easter.

Unless they're on log tables.

Adders are a big plus for our native wildlife

Well quite! but it is very common for creatures (even humans) to lighten the load by peeing or worse when danger appears, which also discourages predators from following them. Adders will probably leave it at that as they have a backup weapon, but grass snakes are  defenceless so will go further - play dead and excrete from their backsides an oily musk substance that stinks to high heaven. Apparently people who have picked up grass snakes can have the foul smell on their hands last for a week or more despite detergents and scrubbing. (And it is illegal to disturb them, so don’t test it)

Saw one down at the bottom of the crag at Sennen earlier this year. Badgerjockey bagged it and released it at the top. No idea what it was doing down there; presumably it had slithered down the cliff.