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To celebrate the Year of the Snake, and mark the 26th year of its snake rescue efforts, Kadoorie Farm and Botanic Garden has launched an art and education exhibition “Side by Side in Harmony: Snakes, Nature and Us.”
The exhibition, which will run until March 3, takes visitors through the farm and its forests, where they can learn about how snakes hear without ears, why snakes have forked tongues, and what residents should do if then encounter a snake in the city.
Local artist Benjamin Hao worked with students from four schools, as well as Kadoorie Farm staff, to create natural dyes and transform old clothes into art works depicting four native snake species: the mock viper, the red-necked keelback, the greater green snake, and the Burmese python.
During the exhibition period, visitors will also have access to the normally restricted Wild Animal Rescue Centre, offering a rare glimpse into snake rescue work.
The education and conservation centre has long sought to raise awareness of snakes in the city and promote residents’ harmonious coexistence with their ophidian counterparts.
Since 1999, Kadoorie Farm has worked with the police and the Agriculture, Fisheries and Conservation Department (AFCD) on the Wild Snake Rescue Project, responding to reports of snakes sighted where they should not be, working with professional snake catchers to capture them, and then returning them to the wild, where possible.
To date, more than 22,000 snakes have been rescued as part of the programme, around 95 per cent of which have been released back into the wild. It also launched a Burmese python conservation project in 2011 to help conserve Hong Kong’s only protected snake species.
The “Side by Side in Harmony: Snakes, Nature and Us” exhibition runs from 10am to 4pm from January 20 until March 5, with the exception of Kadoorie Farm‘s closing days.
Additionally, the farm will offer half-day nature tours from 9.45am to 12.15am and from 1.45pm to 4.15 pm on February 2 and February 9, and on March 1 and March 2.
The Wild Animal Rescue Centre will be open from 10.30am to 12pm on February 8 and February 22, while natural dyeing workshops will be held from 11.45am to 4.15pm on January 21, 23, 26 and 27 and on February 6, 7, 15 and 21.
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