There are many ideas about the snakes that live in Buck Wood, and where they came from. Someone even linked them with the crops grown by the nuns of Esholt Priory – which was closed at the time of Henry VIII and the dissolution of the monasteries!

If you’d like to find out more please click on this link snakes_in_bw.pdf. It might not answer all your questions but we hope it’s an interesting read, and the photos will demonstrate how varied grass snakes can be, and why people are still puzzled about them.

Changes to the taxonomy (how all plants and wildlife are organised and named) of grass snakes in 2017 has meant that we refer to them differently now. The section relevant to Buck Wood’s snakes is as follows:

Family:	Colubridae
Genus:	Natrix
Species:	Natrix natrix	Eastern European (includes Romania)
	Natrix helvetica	native British grass snakes (also known as Barred snakes)

And there are many other grass snakes all of which are now full species rather than sub-species as they were before, and which are all known by their binomial (two-part) names, which usually relate to the country or area where they are found.
​Dr C Alvin.