Uganda Reptile Village **pic heavy**

[das_nooblet]

I just came back from a volunteer/tourism trip to Uganda, and while researching what venomous snakes might be encountered in our area, I stumbled across the Uganda Reptile Village.

URV is a community-based organization founded by Dr. Kabiwe Yasin back in 2003, on the outskirts of Entebbe. All of their current reptiles are either rescues, confiscations or "pest control". My wife and I spent a little over an hour their, and the price was quite reasonable. Entry was 15000 shillings each, and the boda-boda (motorcycle taxi) was 10000 each way from our hotel near the airport (1 USD = ~ 3700 UGX)

Most of the snakes and some of the monitors were in shed or had just recently shed. There were several with badly stuck sheds, and there were often 2 or more (I counted at least 4 mambas) snakes in each habitat, but It still makes me happy that such a place exists even in such a poor country. Better than snakes being killed simply because they are snakes

If you ever find yourself in Entebbe, with a couple of hours to kill, I'd highly recommend a visit


African rock python. We were told this one is about 15' long. Mostly they feed it rabbits, but every now and again it gets a small goat (depending on what is available)



One half of the enclosure.





Jameson's mamba





Egyptian cobra (female)



Male



Forest cobra





Jackson's tree snake





Gaboon viper





Rhinoceros viper. Unfortunately, where he was, I couldn't get a picture from a better angle



Our guide said this was a leopard tortoise, but I think (with my admittedly limited knowledge) it looks a little more like a sulcata. There were another 5-6 tortoises in the enclosure (some of which looked more like leopards), but there's already going to be a lot of pictures for you to scroll through



We were told this one's shell had been damaged by a fire before it came to URV



Nile monitor. Apparently they are at risk in Uganda, as their hide is used for skinning some types of drum.



Assorted chameleons. There were quite a few, all in one big, meshed-in enclosure. These are just my favourites







Nile crocodile. They had 4 of them, biggest looked to be about 6' long.



And lastly, as a bonus for making it this far, 3 sightings (black mamba, Nile crocodiles, random skink) from our game drive and boat cruise through Queen Elizabeth National Park