ADDER or grass snake?

Neither. It's a slow worm.

It was spotted in a private car park in Bridge Street, Hereford, by Twitter user @Patrick_OAP.

Often confused with a snake, the slow worm is, in fact, a legless lizard.

Snakes and lizards are both reptiles, but there are several differences between them:

  1. Slow worms have eyelids.
  2. They are usually found in woods, heathland, and wasteland. They can sometimes be found under stones, logs, grass cuttings, and sheets of plywood, corrugated iron or slate.
  3. Watch out for them hibernating in garden compost heaps, from which they emerge between March and April.
  4. They have a short, partially forked tongue which, unlike snakes, they can't stick out of a closed mouth.
  5. When a bird attempts to eat them they 'freeze'. Sometimes they will shed their tail, which wriggles about for up to 15 minutes. The bird will pick up the tail and fly off, leaving the slow worm alive. The tail then regenerates.