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*We are thinking of staying in Maho Campgrounds and wanted to know if there are poisonous indigenous snakes or spiders/etc in St Johns
I will let an island native answer the question from the "for sure" perspecitve, and I will answer you, as someone that enjoyed a week at Maho Bay Campgrounds 15 years ago and now live on St. Thomas.
In terms of anything here to be afraid of......no. From a purely business perspective, if there were, and folks were having trouble, being bitten by such slithery crawlys!, there would probably not still be a very successful Maho Bay Campground or Eco Tents for that matter.
It is an awesome place......please come and enjoy it without any fears along the line of such creatures. No-seeums on the beach in late afternoon (tiny mosquito) affected the friend I was with, but I had hardly any bites on me, at all.
There are no posionous snakes on the island. There are some little spiders that cause me a bit a of a problem but don't seem to bother most folks. Bring your bug spray and pick up a bug zapper (those tennis racket looking things) and you'll be fine. You'll have a lot of fun. Maho is great!
Pamela
Hello,
Snakes - read https://www.vinow.com/news/aug03/animals.php about endangered animals in the USVI. The tree boa is one of them, next to never seen. So not likey you will see a snake and if you do its endangered, call the fish and wildlife dept.!! And they are not poisonous.
Insects and other things - there are flies, bees, jackspaniards, bumblebees, scorpions, gongolos(not sure thats the right spelling), centipedes, millipedes, well you get the picture. The good news is the bees and other similar animals stick pretty much to hanging around the plants. I have gotten stung by bees though. Rarely seen scorpions. The centipedes and other crawlies always seem to come out more after it rains. Roaches are common and when it rains the winged termites come out in mass quantities and are attracted to light.
Plants - there are some poisonous plants like oleander - but its the sap when ingested that is harmful. The frangipani sap and manchaneel tree sap will make the skin itchy and or burn the skin. Some plants have thorns like bouganvillea, monkey no climb tree, cactus and others. There are itchy plants like sting-a-nettle.
As suggested, bring some bug repellent and you will be fine. Have a great time.
--Islander
