Rovinj: The Sheffield Zoology Field Trip in 1964. Part Three. Reptiles and Amphibians

Algyroides nigropunctatus
from Hellmich

In writing about Sheffield Zoology’s first field course in Rovinj now in Croatia and then part of Yugoslavia at Easter 1964, my mind wandered into the difficulties we encountered in identifying the reptiles and amphibians from the surrounding countryside and town. With the wealth of information now available both in print and online it must be difficult to appreciate that nearly 60 years ago the only source on European species in English was a book by Walter Hellmich¹ published in 1962. I took that with me.

Some specimens were easy to identify from the limited number of illustrations and descriptions. But a juvenile snake (later identified as the Balkan Whip Snake) and what seemed to be one, but possibly two, species of lizard was more problematical. They ended up, and I cannot remember how, with a GP in Wolverhampton, Dr John V. Tranter² who was very active in amateur herpetological circles in the West Midlands. He got hold of a copy of the standard German checklist³ of the time by Robert Mertens and Heinz Wermuth as well as consulting Boulenger’s catalogues of specimens in the British Museum. He found all the unknowns, including those I suspected from the descriptions in Hellmich were the Dalmatian Wall Lizard. That species, originally Lacerta melissellensis⁴ but now Podarcis melissellensis, is now well-known to be polymorphic. In short there were two forms of this species around Rovinj, with one more common than the other. The least common bore a striking resemblance in terms of coloration to the Italian Wall Lizards seen and collected in the area but of lighter build and with smaller, less-pointed jaws.

We finally identified all the species (with current scientific names shown):

Bufo bufo. Common Toad

Bufotes viridis. Green Toad

Hyla arborea. Common Tree Frog

Lissotriton vulgaris. Smooth or Common Newt

Algyroides nigropunctatus. Dalmatian Algyroides, Keeled Lizard

Podarcis muralis. Common Wall Lizard

Podarcis siculus. Italian Wall Lizard

Podarcis melissellensis. Dalmatian Wall Lizard

Pseudopus apodus. Glass Lizard. Glass ‘Snake’, Scheltopusik

Hierophis gemonensis. Balkan Whip Snake

Podarcis sicula campestris
from Hellmich

In our meanderings through the countryside during the late afternoons until, on some days, dusk, we encountered almost nobody. On the edges of the town, the local human inhabitants were at first wary but after establishing that we were not Germans were friendly and helpful. Sons and daughters learning english at school were summoned to translate as best they could and their fathers and grandfathers became even friendlier when I told them that my father had not only been stationed on the island of Vis and had met Tito and his partisans but that he had been through Croatia in the back of an army lorry as far south as Pula in 1945. Eventually the conversation turned to reptiles and they explained to me that in late March only the small lizards and snakes appear from hibernation. In April-May, they said, we could have expected to see larger lizards and snakes as well.

As a matter of interest, I wondered recently what other reptiles are known to occur in the area around Rovinj. I looked at the distribution maps in the 2016 Field Guide⁵ and came up with the following list in addition to those shown above:

Salamandra salamandra. Fire Salamander

Triturus carnifex. Italian Crested Newt

Bombina variegata. Yellow-bellied Toad

Rana dalmatina. Agile Frog

Pelophylax kl. esculenta. Edible Frog

Pelophylax ribibundus. Marsh Frog

Testudo hermanni. Hermann’s Tortoise

Emys orbicularis. European Pond Terrapin

Tarentola mauritanica. Moorish Gecko

Hemidactylus turcicus. Turkish Gecko

Lacerta viridis, Eastern Green Lizard

Zootoca vivipara. Viviparous Lizard

Slow Worm. Anguis fragilis

Hierophis viridiflavus. Western Whip Snake

Elaphe quatuorlineata. Four-lined Snake

Zamensis longissimus. Aesculapian Snake

Coronella austriaca. Smooth Snake

Telescopus fallax. Cat Snake

Natrix natrix. Grass Snake

Natrix tessellata. Dice Snake

Malpolon insignitus. Eastern Montpelier Snake

Vipera ammodytes. Nose-horned Viper

There are a number of reports, mainly from amateur German and Austrian herpetologists, on field trips made to the same area. The nomenclature varies a little because there has been argument over whether, for example, it is the Eastern or Western Green Lizard (L.bilineata) that occurs there while the status of pool frogs, Pelophylax, remains problematical.

We have never been back to Rovinj. Looking at the area on Google Earth there seems to have been considerable expansion of the town. The countryside looks to have been tidied up and I wonder how many areas of scrub with large boulders inhabited by Algyroides have survived. I shall never forget walking along a country lane and hearing a noise which sounded like a huge flock of geese. Only as we got nearer and found no geese did we realise the sound was coming from the bushes and small trees surrounding a pond. The noise was being emitted by male tree frogs, gathered in the early spring waiting for females (a few were around the edges of the pond) to arrive.

European Tree Frog

Green Toad

Common Toad

The above photographs were taken with my Rolleiflex 4 x 4 on Agfacolor CT18 reversal film. Lighting was from a flashbulb. A more unsuitable camera for close-ups would be hard to imagine because of the nature of a twin-lens reflex. The camera was focused through the viewing lens and then raised by the distance between the viewing and taking lens to remove the effect of parallax. Animals could and did absent themselves from the scene while that shift was being made, resulting in a wasted frame.

1 Walter Hellmich (1906-1974) was Chief Keeper of the Zoological Collection of the State Museum in Munich. His book was originally published in German in 1956 (Die Lurche Und Kriechtiere Europas. Heidelberg: Carl Winter). The English version is: Hellmich W. 1962. Reptiles and Amphibians of Europe. (English Editor Alfred Leutscher). London: Blandford.

2 Died 2 November 2014, aged 79

3 Mertens R, Wermuth H. 1960. Die Amphibien und Reptilien Europas. Frankfurt: Kramer. Robert Mertens (1894-1975) and Heinz Wermuth (1918-2002) had revised an earlier checklist by Mertens and Lorenz Müller (1868-1953) (the latter was Hellmich’s mentor in Munich). There was at the time an inordinate fondness for describing subspecies, an enthusiasm I do not share.

4 Named for Melisello, now called Brusnik, an islet near Vis.

5 Speybroeck J, Beukema W, Bok B, Voort J van der, Velikov I. 2016. Field Guide to the Amphibians and Reptiles of Britain and Europe. London: Bloomsbury.

Peaker M, Peaker SJ. 1968. Spring herpetofauna of the Rovinj area (Istria, Yugoslavia). British Journal of Herpetology 4, 36‑37.

Lilge D, Wicker R. 1972. Bemerkungen zu den Eidechsen der Umgebung von Rovinj (lstrien). Salamandra 8, 128-136.