Storks are also seen at Dong Tam Snake Farm

This is the province’s biggest such facility and one of the country’s largest snake breeding and anti-venom making center. Covering 11 hectares, the farm, about 10km from My Tho City, has a collection of over 50 species of snakes, including poisonous ones, such as king cobras, Colubridae snakes and pythons.

The farm’s snake museum has been certified as the first snake museum of Vietnam by the Vietnam Records Book Center. Next to the museum are restaurants serving snake dishes including rice soup with snake, snake salad and fried snake bones.

Visiting the Dong Tam farm, tourists can learn how to treat snakebites, remove venom and use venom as medicine. Snake wine, powder, glue and anti-venom are available at shops around there.

Apart from snakes, Dong Tam is home to sheep, ostriches, tortoises, monkeys, birds and crocodiles, as well as a lot of large trees, green space and lakes. The farm is not only a place for preserving rare snake species and doing research on snakes but a center for visitors to indulge in wildlife and explore nature.

Tickets for admission to the farm cost VND25,000 (around US$1) per adult and VND15,000 per child.

A foreign visitor plays with a python      A close look at Equatorial spitting cobra     People gather around an area for raising Monocled cobra – Photos: Minh Nga

Minh Nga

SGT