# need help identifying a snake by the skin I found



## rburoker (Apr 8, 2014)

I live on the north side of Brisbane and found a snake skin in our yard. It's just a small one but not sure of the type. It's not a full skin. It appears the head and part of the upper body are missing. The scales on the back side (near what I believe is the tail) is 6 across. The further up the body it is 16 to 19.


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## kwaka_80 (Apr 8, 2014)

Wow that's going to be a hard one, my guess would be thrown to possible brown or red belly, both have ~17 scales across mid body, was there any patterning on the skin. Do you have any idea on cloaca scale? Both species also have devided anal scales... Sorry you may just have to physically see the snake for proper I.D

Cheers, Matt


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## rburoker (Apr 9, 2014)

*thanks*

Thanks Matt,

I am not sure on the cloaca scale. It does appear that the skin is maybe 1/3 to 1/4 of the body and all of the tail. Where I am guessing the anal scales start to the end of the tail it's divided. from the anal forward along the body it's single and fairly wide. The scales on the body appear to be more diamond shaped and the colour of the skin is darker in color at the peak of the body and lightens as it works toward the body. Given the length of the tail and what there is of the body, I would venture a guess that the snake is probably 2 - 2 1/2 feet long.

The day that I found the skin, our neighbour saw a green tree snake in his yard. We have also seen carpet pythons around. Though the area we live in, there have been sightings of red bellies and brown.

Rick



kwaka_80 said:


> Wow that's going to be a hard one, my guess would be thrown to possible brown or red belly, both have ~17 scales across mid body, was there any patterning on the skin. Do you have any idea on cloaca scale? Both species also have devided anal scales... Sorry you may just have to physically see the snake for proper I.D
> 
> Cheers, Matt


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## CamdeJong (Apr 9, 2014)

Pretty sure it's Dendrelaphis punctulata (Common Tree Snake). They have extremely distinctive scales - the scales along the vertebral line are an odd pentagonal shape, and the scales down the flanks are very different to the classic shape, kind of flattened nearer the dorsum.


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## Bluetongue1 (Apr 12, 2014)

I think your mid-body scale count is out. The most I can count is 6 across the dorsum, which would indicate double that, plus one to three, around the body. This fits with 13 for a CTS (_Dendrelaphis punctulatus_) or rarely 15. CTS have a ridged angle near the ends of the ventrals (to help with climbing). When shed, this folds inwards, obscuring the transition from ventral scales to body scales, as seen on the skin. I agree with *Cam* about the typical pentagonal shaped scales. It is pretty much certainly a Common Tree Snake slough.

A photo (off the web) showing the angled ridge along each side of the ventral scales of the CTS...


Blue


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