We studied a snake assemblage from

The Brown Vine snake, Oxybelis aeneus (Wagler, 1824), is widely distributed from the United States to Argentina. 113 specimens encountered in the field and 39 individuals from scientific collections were analyzed and we determined patterns of diet, habitat use, and daily and seasonal activity. Oxybelis aeneus can be found to be active year round, especially during the dry and warmer months. Daily temperature poorly describes its activity as it seems to be more active around 31 to 35°C. During the hours of inactivity the species tends to chose higher branches than when active. The snakes choose spiny trees as retreat sites and spineless trees as foraging sites. We suggest that the high abundance of O. aeneus makes it an appropriate model organism for studies on activity patterns of snakes in semi-arid environments.

ResumoAnimais menos carismáticos são mais propensos a atropelamento: atitudes humanas em relação a pequenos animais nas estradas brasileiras. Estradas são fontes longas e intermitentes de diminuição da vida selvagem devido aos seus efeitos indiretos, como fragmentação de hábitat, ou seus efeitos diretos, como a constante mortalidade por atropelamentos. Assim, alguns estudos indicam que parte desses atropelamentos pode ser intencional e passível de ser evitada. Nós investigamos se diferentes grupos de pequenos animais apresentaram diferentes taxas de atropelamento e como o "carisma" afeta as chances de sobrevivência de um animal nas rodovias. Durante nosso experimento, nós quantiicamos as taxas de atropelamento de modelos de aranhas, serpentes, pintos e folhas de árvore (controle) em três rodovias de diferentes volumes de tráfego. Constatamos que serpentes e aranhas foram consistentemente atropeladas com maior frequência que os pintos e as folhas. Também observamos que os pintos foram os únicos modelos resgatados pelos humanos. Concluímos que as chances de sobrevivência dos pintos é a maior entre os modelos testados e isso se deve ao valor carismático atribuído a eles pelos seres humanos, em comparação a serpentes e aranhas. Sugerimos a veiculação de campanhas na mídia que visem a aumentar a conscientização do público quanto à conservação da vida selvagem como uma ferramenta útil para solucionar o problema do atropelamento intencional de pequenos animais. Palavras-chave:Aranhas; Conlitos com a vida selvagem; Conservação; Ecologia de estradas; Serpentes AbstractRoads are long and intermittent sources of wildlife loss due to their indirect effects, such as fragmentation of habitat, or their direct effects, such as constant mortality by run-over. Thus, some studies indicate that a portion of these run-over incidents may be intentional and could be avoided. We investigated whether various groups of small animals had different run-over rates and how "charisma" affects the survival chances of an animal on the roads. During our experiment, we quantiied run-over rates for models of spiders, snakes, chicks, and tree leaves (control) on three roads with different trafic volumes. We found out that snakes and spiders were consistently ran over with a higher frequency than chicks and leaves. We also observed that chicks were the only models rescued by human beings. We concluded that the survival chances of chicks are the highest among the models tested and this is due to the charismatic value attributed to them by human beings, when compared to snakes and spiders. We suggest the broadcasting of campaigns in the media to increase public awareness regarding wildlife conservation as a useful tool to solve the problem of intentional run over of small animals.

No abstract

The choice of sampling methods is a crucial step in every field survey in herpetology. In countries where time and financial support are limited, the choice of the methods is critical. The methods used to sample snakes often lack objective criteria, and the traditional methods have apparently been more important when making the choice. Consequently researches using not-standardized methods are frequently found in the literature. We have compared four commonly used methods for sampling snake assemblages in a semiarid area in Brazil. We compared the efficacy of each method based on the cost-benefit regarding the number of individuals and species captured, time, and financial investment. We found that pitfall traps were the less effective method in all aspects that were evaluated and it was not complementary to the other methods in terms of abundance of species and assemblage structure. We conclude that methods can only be considered complementary if they are standardized to the objectives of the study. The use of pitfall traps in short-term surveys of the snake fauna in areas with shrubby vegetation and stony soil is not recommended.