Несколько лет наблюдений понадобилоcь биологу и фотографу Николаю Шпиленку, чтобы собрать уникальную коллекцию запечатленных на пленку сцен из жизни обыкновенных ужей. В природе они избегают встречи с человеком, поэтому многие факты из их "биографии" остаются под покровом тайны

Injuries of various types are widespread in animals and presumably have implications at the population level (e.g. reduced future survivorship). We studied patterns of injury acquisition in a population of grass snakes (Natrix natrix) in south-eastern England. Injuries suffered by grass snakes were of various types, including broken bones, assorted scars and wounds, and tail loss. What causes such injuries is unknown, but predators seem most likely. We predicted that the probability of having an injury would be higher for larger snakes, for several reasons (e.g. larger snakes are older and thus have had more opportunity to be injured). We also predicted that injury rates would be higher in females because, when gravid, they are expected to bask in the open more than other snakes. Our data strongly supported the first of these predictions, but not the second. Males had significantly higher injury rates than females of the same body size. However, because males grow more slowly and mature at a smaller body size than females, higher injury rates of males might simply reflect their smaller size at a given age. Even if age plays a role in influencing acquisition of injuries, other, more directly size-related factors also might be important. Two possibilities are that small snakes might be less likely to survive an injury or that small snakes spend more time hidden and so are less likely to encounter large predators. We lack data on the first of these, but data on sizes of snakes found under cover versus those found in the open are consistent with the second. Studies of injury rates in snakes need to move beyond the descriptive stage and begin to test the broader consequences of injuries.

The diet of grass snakes (Natrix natrix) on the mainland and an island of Italy was compared by pooling literature data and original data. A total of 535 prey items were recorded (444 prey items from specimens >40 cm SVL), but the number of items was very variable between sites. Body lengths (both sexes) varied between geographical areas, and females were larger than males in all study areas. Specimens from the island (central Sardinia) and from one mainland mountainous locality (Duchessa Mountains) were significantly smaller than those from all the other localities. Amphibians were the main prey for both sexes, but females ate more toads and fewer frogs or tadpoles than males; females also consumed more rodents than males. There was a strong effect of locality on diet composition i.e. newts/salamanders were found only in two montane areas; hylids were found only in the single island area; and rodents were commonly preyed upon only at a single mainland locality. Two lizard corpses (Podarcis muralis) were scavenged by grass snakes at a mainland locality. The presence of the piscivorous snake Natrix tessellata, a potential competitor for food, did not have any apparent effect on the food types eaten by grass snakes because grass snakes consumed fish when sympatric with N. tessellata, but not at other sites. The dietary variation exhibited by grass snakes suggests that, by shifting their diets to other prey, they might be able to persist in areas where their usual natural prey has declined drastically, but this remains to be demonstrated.

A five-year mark-recapture study at Sella Nevea, a montane (1100 m a.s.l.) site in the Carnie Alps, provided information on diets, growth rates, and reproductive output in an Italian population of the wide-ranging grass snake, Natrix natrix. Our snakes resembled a previously-studied population in lowland Sweden in terms of body size at sexual maturation in females (70 cm) and mean adult female body length (82 cm). However, growth rates were lower in our population, and sexual maturation was delayed (6-8 years, versus 4-5 years in Sweden), perhaps because of the cool climate and relatively brief growing period each year. Females produced a single clutch of 4-24 eggs in late July each year. Larger families produced larger clutches, but clutch size relative to maternal size was lower than in Swedish grass snakes. Hatchling sizes and Relative Clutch Masses (RCMs) did not shift with increasing female size. RCMs may provide a useful index of 'costs of reproduction' in this population, because females with high RCMs were very emaciated after oviposition, and hence may experience a greater risk of mortality, as well as a high expenditure. Prolonged incubation gave rise to longer, thinner hatchlings, but the low environmental temperatures at the study site may favour early hatching (and hence, result in a shorter fatter hatchling emerging from the egg, with more of its energy stores unused). Compared to sympatric viviparous snakes (Coronella austriaca and Vipera berus), the oviparous grass snakes can achieve a much higher reproductive output owing to a larger clutch size and more frequent reproduction (annual, rather than biennial or triennial). The abundant prey resource used by grass snakes (amphibians) may also enable them to recoup energy more rapidly after reproduction; dietary composition shifts ontogenetically in both sexes, with the largest prey (mice and adult toads) taken primarily by large female snakes.

Partially melanic specimen of the grass snake Natrix natrix  (Linnaeus, 1758) from  the Eastern Carpathians collected for the first time in Slovakia is described in detail. The morphological characters are within the ranges of subspecies N. n. natrix reported for Slovakia.

Molecular phytogeny and evolutionary history of the genus Natrix, with notes on the intraspecific differentiation of N. natrix. To elucidate the evolutionary history of the genus Natrix and to address questions of intraspecilic variation in N. natrix, we analysed sequences of four mitochondrial genes. With the help of fossil and paleogeographic information a molecular clock was calibrated to estimate the most impor¬tant divergence times. Our data clearly support a genus phytogeny with N. maura at the basal position and N. natrix and N. tessdlata assister species. With evolutionary rates of 1-1.35 % diver¬gence per one million years and genetic distances of 13.4-14.5 % between species and up to 8.9 % within species, the three species probably evolved independently since the middle Miocene and intraspecific differentiation most likely started in the late Miocene. Intraspecific genetic variation in all three species is clearly correlated to geographic regions. Although the available sampling is far too small to allow for a comprehensive discussion of intraspecific differentiation in N. ma¬trix, our data clearly support a European origin for the species and suggest that at least five evo¬lutionary lineages can be distinguished on the Eurasian mainland. These lineages correspond to populations from (1) the Iberian peninsula, (2) Italy, western Germany, France, and England, (3) Germany east of the river Rhine and Scandinavia, (4) the Balcans and southern Greece, and (5) Turkey, the Caucasian countries, Russia and Kazakhstan. A comparison of these lineages with the phenotypically derived subspecies in N. natrix supports the existence of a contact zone between two distinct taxonomical lineages in central Europe as well as the differentiation of the Iberian {N. n. astreptophora) and western European populations (N. n helvetica).