PORT MORESBY
National Capital District
5-8 November 2006

The final three days in Port Moresby were taken up with cage building, data collecting and scale counting, taking DNA samples and photography. Now was the time to get good photographs of the dangerous species we had captured, under controlled conditions and near to Port Moresby General Hospital's Accident and Emergency Dept., just in case. A few Port Moresby herps put in an appearance, ie. Mutulated gecko (Gehyra mutilata) and Fragile forest skink (Sphenomorphus cf. fragilis).

LIZARDS from PORT MORESBY click on an image to enlarge
Mutilated gecko, Gehyra mutilata
Fragile forest skink, Sphenomorphus cf. fragilis

Bina also got some good footage of the large Papuan taipan (Oxyuranus scutellatus canni) from Moreguina, Fat Albert, moving over the ground.

Bina filming Fat Albert, the taipan.

I also had to prepare a PowerPoint presentation and a quiz for the Exotic Venomous Snake Forum, an event being coordinated by AVRU at Melbourne Zoo from 9-10 November.

Bina and I also visited Phil and Brenda Willmott-Sharp, old friends from my 1986 and 1990 visits to PNG and as Independent Publishing the publishers of A Guide to the Snakes of Papua New Guinea (1996). Sadly this would be the last time I would see Phil, who had advanced diabetes with complications, he passed away suddenly in 2007.

Phil and Brenda Willmott-Sharp, my friends and publishers.	The view of Port Moresby from Independent Haus, home of the Willmott-Sharps.

Snakebusters PNG 2006 had been a highly successful expedition. We had accumulated 34 elapids for the AVRU project as detailed below:

Papuan taipan Oxyuranus scutellatus canni 10
New Guinea brownsnake Pseudonaja textilis   3
New Guinea small-eyed snake Micropechis ikaheka   6
Smooth-scaled death adder Acanthophis laevis 12
Black whipsnake Demansia vestigiata   1
Müller’s crowned snake Aspidomorphus muelleri   2

Total elapids 34

Papuan taipan, Oxyuranus scutellatus canni

On 9 November Dave, Bina and I flew to Cairns, and on to Melbourne.