Reptile & Amphibian Forums

hi all. yesterday i saw a website that had a program to measure your snakes (dont remember if it worked for all herps) by using overhead pictures and an object of a known size, for those of us with snakes that wont sit still long enoguh to be measured normally
but forgot to bookmark it, and now i cant find it. does anybody know where this page, or something like it, might be found? thanks
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proud mama to:
1.0.0 ball python
0.0.1 albino florida kingsnake
1.0.0 leopard gecko
0.1.0 colombian rainbow boa
0.1.0 bearded dragon
1.1.0 colombian redtailed boas (on the way!)

http://serpwidgets.com/cornsnakes/Apps/apps.html

It works great for any herp.

You can make a snake squeeze box to measure snakes that won't remain still long enough. It would entail some carpentry but is otherwise easy to construct. A typical squeeze box consists of a large flatish box with sides about 4 to 6 inches high and a base that measures pretty much whatever size you want, just take into consideration the size of the snakes you'll be measuring. The top is simply a 1/4" plexiglass panel attached by hinges. The inside is filed with a large sheet or sheets of egg crate foam. The snake is placed inside and squeezed into immobility between the the foam and the plexi. One can then use a string laid out along the body of the snake as viewed through the plexi or trace it with a dry erase marker. Either way you get a quick accurate measurement. This is a method used by many field researchers for measuring venemous species. It is also one of the few truly accurate ways of measuring a snake. Trying to straighten a snake often results in stretching the body slightly which can give an inaccurate measurement but also is stressful and potentially harmful to the snake.

Matt Campbell

is that you don't have to strech out the snake at all. You simply take a picture of it next to some unit of known measure (a ruler is an obvious choice). It doesn't matter is the snake is stretched, coiled or whatever. Then you scan/load the picture into the program, teach the program the unit of measure, trace the snake with your mouse, and you have a fairly precise, unstretched measurement.

I have used it repeatedly on the same snake using several different photos and different units of measure and found it gives pretty accurate results.
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Chris Harrison