Snakes of Europe/Species/Platyceps najadum

Platyceps najadum, known commonly as Dahl's whip snake, is a species of snake in the genus Platyceps of the Colubridae family. It was first described by Eichwald in 1831.



Geographic range
Platyceps najadum is found in the Balkans, Aegean, Cyprus, the Mid-East and as far as Turkmenistan and the Caucasus mountains.

Description
Stated as occuring in dry and xeric environments in a wide range of habitat, in desert and rocky land, in forests, woodland scrub and agricultural land from sea level to 2000m altitude. Commonly found in fields, and seen crushed on roads. It has a slim body rarely over a metre in length http://wildlife-archipelago.gr/wordpress/reptiles/dahls-whip-snake/. This snake is threatened by direct persecution, forest fires and intensive agriculture, where range interacts with human interests. Non-venomous.

Biology
Egg laying, females lay between 3 and 16 eggs in a clutch

List of subspecies
Five or six subspecies are identified.
 * Platyceps najadum albitemporalis (Darevsky & Orlov, 1994)
 * Platyceps najadum atayevi (Tuniyev & Shammakov, 1993), Kopet-Dag, Iran/Turkmenistan.
 * Platyceps najadum dahlii (Fitzinger, 1826), Balkans, Cyprus, Aegean Turkey,
 * Platyceps najadum kalymnensis (Schneider, 1979), endemic to Kalymnos island, the Aegean
 * Platyceps najadum najadum (Eichwald, 1831), Caucuses and Asia Minor
 * Platyceps najadum schmidtleri (Schätti & Mccarthy, 2001, Zagros mountains, Iran

Indigenous names
(gr) Σαϊτα, Saita