My main target species for this year (apart from a nice, eight-foot Taiwan Beauty Snake) is the Chinese cobra. Since my exciting, but unsatisfying
encounter with an adult two months ago I've met many people with just as many cobra stories, but never the snake itself. The locals insist that cobras don't really come out before high summer, which begins this month, and now I have at least some proof: there's a lonely, two-mile stretch of dead-end blacktop winding through a completely uninhabited and untouched forest up at 2500 feet in the National Park behind our house, and that's where I found this freshly deceased (two hours tops, I think) hatchling last Wednesday morning. No substitute for a real live one, I know, but at least I had the chance to get a real good, close look at his markings, so now I'm prepared and know what I'll be looking at should a real encounter take place in the hopefully not too far future. During my first morning walk there I saw Asian Green Snakes and
Elaphe carinata, as well as lots of sleeping nocturnal snakes (Taiwan habus,
Boigas) in the drainage pipes that are part of the landslide-preventing stone walls running along parts of the road. I'm guessing there's more cobras where this one came from, so with a bit of luck, I'll run into one sooner or later....
PS: This road is an important part of my night cruising route, and now that I've seen how productive the mornings can be there, it'll also become an important part of my weight loss program, as I'll be walking those four miles every weekday morning before breakfast. Even if I don't see any more cobras, at least it'll be good for my health
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