Bengaluru: Rat snake found in a photocopy machine at Jayanagar police station

Bengaluru, Sep 14: A rat snake was found inside a photocopy machine at Jayanagara police station in Bengaluru, Karnataka on Saturday.

The snake was later rescued and handed over to forest officials of Karnataka.

Indian rat snake, 'darash' or dhaman, ghora pachar is a common species of colubrid snake found in parts of South and Southeast Asia. Dhamans are large snakes. Typical mature total length is around 1.5 to 1.95 m (4 ft 11 into 6 ft 5 in) though specimens exceeding 2 m (6 ft 7 in) are often not uncommon. The record-sized length for this species was recorded as 3.7 m (12 ft 2 in).

Apart from these, it can be identified precisely by checking posterior body reticulated with black color net-like markings. Traditionally people differentiate between Cobra and Rat Snake by accepting Rat Snake to be a snake having head broader than neck or neck thinner than mid-body.

The body is slender with smooth and keeled scales. Keeled scales present on 4-8 topmost rows mostly on the posterior body. A regular black, yellow and white band like markings present on the whole body according to the color of the dorsal.

Earlier, a flying snake was seized from the possession of a man in Bhubaneswar. Where it was revealed that the man used to earn his livelihood by displaying the snake to the public.

Bhubaneshwar city forest division in charge earlier said, "It's offense under Wildlife Protection Act. We're investigating. We'll release it in the forest."