Malaysia's serpents: Caught in the coils of change

The beautiful gold-ringed cat-eye snake (Boiga melanota). — MUHAMMAD ARIFF KHAIDHIR CHEK MAT

SNAKES – or their Chinese zodiac counterpart anyway – are having their moment in the sun.

The Chinese calendar officially ushers out the Dragon and welcomes the Snake on Jan 29, and shops are already stocked full of red paper cuttings, dolls, and other embodiments of the reptile. Some nail salons are even offering snake-themed manicures!

However, while our local folklore is replete with awe-inspiring snake legends – think Madam White Snake or the Naga that inhabits Tasik Chini – in real life, the relationship between humans and snakes in Malaysia is a lot more ambiguous and complicated.

That’s ironic considering that Malaysia is home to over 100 snake species, making the country one of the most popular destinations for herpetology (snake) tours. Advertised on social media and the Internet, these services are often replete with gorgeous glossy photos of snakes.

Herpetology – from herpeton in Greek for reptile or creeping animal – is the study of amphibians and reptiles, in this case, snakes.

Malaysia even hosted the 10th World Congress of Herpetology in August last year in Kuching, an event attended by over 1,400 delegates, including researchers, conservationists, and enthusiasts.

“Similar to many other parts of the world, the general public here tends to view snakes in a negative light, which often leads to wanton and unnecessary killing of snakes,” says Universiti Malaysia Sabah’s Assoc Prof Dr Evan Quah Seng Huat.

These misconceptions about snakes, he adds, have caused many species to be persecuted even though the majority of the species in Malaysia are non-venomous and not dangerous to people.

Quah, who is with the university’s Institute for Tropical Biology and Conservation, is a herpetologist who has been studying amphibians and reptiles in Malaysia and South-East Asia for over a decade.

Both Peninsular Malaysia and Sabah and Sarawak in Borneo have around 143 species of land snakes each, a “relatively rich assemblage” – as Quah describes it – of species comparable with other tropical regions of the world of a similar latitude.

Species like the reticulated python (Malayopython reticulatus) continue to hog media attention due to the sheer scale of its size and a tendency to slither into people’s homes and even cars, but the country is also home to the equatorial spitting cobra (Naja sumatrana), common wolf snake (Lycodon capucinus), the painted bronze back (Dendrelaphis pictus), the oriental vine snake (Ahaetulla prasina) and the strikingly beautiful yet venomous Malayan blue coral snake (Calliophis bivirgatus).

Nature guide and photographer Muhammad Ariff Khaidhir Chek Mat (holding torch) with clients from Singapore taking photos of a snake. Snakes are popular enough to have tours dedicated to them, with tourists wanting to see them in the wild. — MUHAMMAD ARIFF KHAIDHIR CHEK MAT

Another interesting species, and the current darling of herp enthusiasts, is the limestone eyelash pit viper (Trimeresurus ciliaris), which has small eye scales that resemble eyelashes when seen from the side. Discovered only in 2023 in Thailand, a similar-looking snake has also been recorded in Perlis.

According to Quah, there are even some extremely rare snake species in Malaysia that are only known from the type specimens collected during the time of their discovery and have not been observed since.

“Examples of this would include the Engkari pipe snake (Cylindrophis engkariensis), slender reed snake (Calamaria gracillima), and Prakke’s reed snake (Calamaria prakkei).

“While there are many species of snakes that are common to both Peninsular Malaysia and Borneo, both regions have many of their own endemic species and genera.

“These taxa are restricted to either Peninsular Malaysia or Borneo,” Quah explains.

Examples of these are the reed snakes of the genus Macrocalamus that are only found in the peninsula whereas the Stoliczka’s rough-backed snake (Paraxenodermus borneensis) and Chasen’s mountain pit viper (Garthius chaseni) are only found in Borneo.

“Malaysia is definitely a popular destination among snake enthusiasts because of the many unique and endemic species found in the country,” says Quah (see story on nature guide Muhammad Ariff Khaidhir Chek Mat and his snakey tours here).

However, the runaway impact of climate change fuelled by global warming from carbon emissions has affected the survival of snakes – as it has all wildlife – in Malaysia.

Extreme weather patterns such as heatwaves that plague parts of the country at the beginning of the year, and the constant flooding due to heavier rainfall, mean that the reptiles have to adapt fast or risk endangerment.

Snakes, says Quah, are cold- blooded organisms that have to thermoregulate according to their surroundings. As cold-blooded animals, snakes do not have an internal mechanism to maintain their body temperature and need to rely on the temperature of their surrounding environment to keep warm or cool.

“Heatwaves, for example, will make it difficult for some species to keep cool when their habitat dries up. It can cause species that live in the leaf litter and require damp conditions to desiccate and die,” Quah says.

“Flooding will also cause some species to flee from their habitats when they are inundated, and they may end up seeking shelter in human homes, which then leads to more human-snake conflict,” he says.

In February 2024, when much of the northern part of Peninsular Malaysia, including Kelantan, was under heat warnings, the state’s Civil Defence Force captured 1,073 snakes of various species in human spaces. This was an increase from the 991 snakes it caught in January 2024, and a slight reduction from the 934 reptiles in March 2024.

Its director, Colonel Mohd Adzhar Mujab, had then attributed this to snakes emerging from the forests due to the hot and dry weather.

According to the World Health Organisation’s (WHO) website in September 2024, increased frequency of natural disasters and extreme weather events from climate change is already affecting the abundance and activity patterns of snakes, bringing them closer to humans, and this will increase over time.

This does not bode well for humans: Globally, someone is bitten by a snake every 10 seconds, according to WHO estimates.

“Snakebite envenoming is a potentially life-threatening disease caused by toxins in the bite of a venomous snake. Snake bites are estimated to cause about 81,000 to 138,000 deaths and 400,000 permanent disabilities globally each year,” WHO notes, adding that current published evidence on snake bites is a “gross underestimate”.

The global health body emphasises the need for better data on, for example, location and types of snake bites, as well as the presence or absence of long-term health impacts.

Besides climate change, snakes also have to contend with the deforestation and habitat loss that come with development increasingly encroaching into what’s left of our wilderness areas.

“With the continuous deforestation and habitat degradation occurring all over the country, I would say that some snake species have definitely become harder to encounter as their habitats are destroyed,” says Quah.

Malaysian Nature Society Herpetofauna Group coordinator Chan Yik Khan agrees.

“Habitat loss and poaching has contributed to a decline of snake species in the wild,” he says, adding that “most certainly” some local species are hard to find now.

Hopefully the fate and health of serpents continue to be on Malaysians’ mind even after the Year of the Snake has long loomed and slithered past. After all, their fate is inextricably linked to our own.