Snake Diversity at Universitas Indonesia’s Urban Forest

Abstract

Universitas Indonesia’s urban forest is part of Universitas Indonesia’s campus located at Depok, West Java. It is modified into an educational forest, green open space, and water absorption area. The condition of urban forest created its own built environment, which is transformed into an unavoidable interaction between human and wildlife, including snake. Some species that are found at the academic area consisted of local species and introduced species from urban area around campus. It is interesting to know about the diversity of the species at Universitas Indonesia’s urban forest. We used visual encounter survey (VES) as a method to collect all data from 2017 to 2018, including obtained report that has been reported to us. The result showed that the diversity index of snake at Universitas Indonesia’s urban forest in 2018 is higher than in 2017. Its composition consists of Naja sputatrix, Ahaetula prassina, Dendrelaphis pictus, Phyton reticulatus, Xenopeltis unicolor, Pareas carinatus, and Ptyas korros. Those snakes are easily found at Universitas Indonesia’s urban forest during wet season.