Short Notes

Abstract

Although habitat structure is one of the main factors potentially affecting snake ecology at both the individual (in uence of habitat features on snake communities of western Europe have rarely been evaluated (e.g., Luiselli and Capizzi, 1997; Ï CeirN ans, 2002). Moreover, although 70.28% of Italian woodlands is subjected to coppice management (i.e. to cutting at regular time intervals, Angle, 1992), there are no data available on the effects of timbering on the structure of snake communities in Mediterranean central Italy. In this note, I report on the effects of timbering on the snake community of "Monti della Tolfa", a Mediterranean area about 70 km north-west of Rome, by comparing the composition of the snake community before and after an event of wood cutting.The "Monti della Tolfa" is a hilly area (150-550 m a.s.l., 42 ± 08 0 N, 12 ± 00 0 E) characterized by a Mediterraneantemperate climate, with cold winters (usually without snow), rainy spring and autumn, and dry and hot summers (hypomesaxeric subregion [type B] according to Tomaselli et al., 1973). The total area surveyed (surroundings of "Rota"), about 25 ha, is characterized, by open grassy elds interspersed with bushes (Spartium junceum, Cytisus scoparius, Prunus spinosa, Rubus ulmifolius, Rosa canina and Crataegus monogyna) and woodlots of Quercus pubescens and Pirus piraster (Spada, 1977). This area is also characterized by several stony walls, partially covered by vegetation. In 1997 about 10 ha of the bushy area were completely cut down. The remaining part, on the contrary, was left untouched.

Effects of restoration habitats on snake species of Dghoumes National Park (Tunisia)

“…In To measure snakes frequency, I divided the total number of snakes observed by the effort in the field (numbers of hours spent in searching for snakes). Since effort in the field inside DNP intermediate plain and effort in the field outside DNP intermediate plain was different, for any comparisons between the numbers of snakes observed and expected inside and outside DNP, during the field study, I used the same method described in Seigel (1992) which permits the calculation of the expected numbers of snakes in relation to capture effort (see also Filippi, 2003). I first determined the relative sampling effort per area by dividing the number of hours spent in each area by the total number of hours spent in the field during the entire research period.…”