Snakes

"The snake is an animal...
It has a backbone and a heart.
It has red blood and drinks water and eats food.
It breathes air and feels fear, just like every other animal in the world...
And it's in a body that is the hardest thing for the average person to understand."
Dave Barker, herpetologist.

Snakes are undoubtedly the most fascinating of our vertebrate animals. Whilst it is only a very small percentage of people who look on snakes with affection, everyone has a story, myth or opinion on them. People are amazed by snakes, whether it is because of their connections to the biblical serpents, unique lifestyle, or that some species can kill with deadly poisons. Snakes are a great conversation starter. It is unfortunate that most of these conversations are not based on fact. There are many popular stories about snakes which are so far from the truth, it is hard to credit that anyone can believe them.

In Australia, we have many large and/or potentially deadly snakes, and this fuels peoples' fear of them and leads to many harmless snakes and even lizards being killed. Most people in Australia have a snake in their yard at some time; many are permanent residents, and have shared our yards with us for many years. It is only when people actually see them that they are aware of their existence.

Snakes are rarely aggressive and prefer to slip away rather than confront something as large as a human. They can also be an asset around the home. Many snakes eat rodents and other pests.

All snakes are protected. There is seldom a justifiable reason to kill one. Potentially dangerous snakes can be relocated by trained snake handlers. Untrained persons should never attempt to relocate or kill them. Around 90 per cent of those people bitten by snakes are attempting to catch or kill them. Give snakes room and there should be no conflict.

A great source of information about Queensland snakes can be found at the
Queensland Museum Explorer Website.

If you need assistance with a snake, call either the Queensland National Parks and Wildlife Service (07-3202 0200) or the Conservation section of your local Council.
Wildlife groups may also be able to supply details of competent snake handlers.

The Python

The Python (sub-family Pythoninae), together with the closely related boas (sub-family Boinae), contain most of the snakes which make up this non-venomous family.
Whereas the boas are characteristic of the Americas, the pythons are Old World snakes, ranging from Africa through Asia and the Indo-Malayan Archipelago to Australia.

Most Australian pythons are able climbers, some of them spending much of their lives in trees or shrubs. Compared with other Australian snakes their scales are relatively small, which in turn allows their skin to stretch more, so that they can accommodate relatively larger items of food. Their belly scales, too, are not as broad as in most land snakes and are often ridged as an aid to climbing.

There are two small claws or spurs found in most pythons, situated one on either side of the vent, which represents the vestiges of the hind limb structures.
The spurs are generally much larger in males than females and have taken on a secondary sexual function, being used to stimulate the female prior to, and during mating.

In Australia, pythons are most plentiful in species and numbers in the northern parts of the continent. None are found in Tasmania. The best known and most widely distributed of all is the Carpet Snake (Morelia spilota variegata) and (Morelia spilota imbricata), a python growing to more than 3 metres in length.
The Carpet Snake is very variable in colour and pattern, but is typically a shade of rich brown with blotches or cross-bands of darker brown edged with black.
Brilliantly patterned forms, with contrasting bands and blotches of black edged with yellow and chocolate-brown are found in some of the wet, densely forested parts of north-eastern Queensland.

Like most Australian pythons, the Carpet Snake is largely nocturnal in its habits, though it sometimes likes to bask in the sun. In the drier inland regions it spends more time on the ground, and is often found in or around rabbit warrens, for rabbits are much sought after as food. Nevertheless it will often take to trees in search of birds and mammals.
Pythons are often kept by farmers in barns and fodder stores in an effort to control rats and mice.

Pythons are non-venomous 'constructing' snakes; that is, they kill their prey by throwing tight coils of their bodies around it until it suffocates.
Contrary to popular belief, they do not physically crush their prey, and its tissues remain intact. They feed almost exclusively on backboned animals, more especially on the warm-blooded birds and mammals.

Pythons are able to eat animals which at first sight appear much too large to be swallowed. Like other snakes they do not chew their food, but swallow it whole; their jaws, like those of other snakes, are so loosely articulated and their skin so distendable, that they can swallow an object several times their own girth.
Once caught in their jaws an animal has little chance of escaping from the numerous, strong, backwardly curved teeth.

Australian pythons are egg-layers, and unlike most other snakes the female both protects and incubates the eggs until they hatch. During this time she coils around the eggs, which are piled into a clump; she may leave the eggs briefly to warm herself by basking in the sun, after which she returns to her position and transfers some heat to the eggs. Some incubating pythons have been found to produce heat internally by a little-understood mechanism involving rapid muscle spasms; this physiological heat production can raise the snake's temperature by several degrees Celsius above that of its surroundings. Whether this method is widely used by pythons in the wild to elevate their body temperatures during incubation is not yet known.

from the book Australian Reptiles in Colour by Harold G. Cogger

My Creatures

Hi, My name is Zen and I am a male MORELIA SPILOTA, or what is commonly known as a CARPET PYTHON.
I was hatched back in January of 1990 in the Townsville area and relocated to Brisbane, Queensland when I was 4 days old, travelling by aircraft to where I am now cared for in a nice environment.
I am allowed to crawl around the apartment quite often and really enjoy basking in the sun out on the balcony.
I have a lovely house inside my carers office, where I can keep an eye on what he is doing.
We get on pretty well although he doesn’t take me rock climbing much anymore which we used to do a lot when we lived by the Kangaroo Point Cliffs.

Another one I have is known as Zelda and she is a female MORELIA SPILOTA, also commonly known as a CARPET PYTHON.
She was hatched in February 1995 in Brisbane and moved into her new home when she was just 2 days old along with one of her brothers and a sister, who have since moved out.
She has a little problem growing and is often refered to as The Toy.
She also lives in the office and likes to watch me whenever I am in there working, but she is quite shy really and anti social and can get very grumpy at times.

I also have another female MORELIA SPILOTA, also commonly known as a CARPET PYTHON known as Zuma who came to me from a friends collection a number of years ago who is also a little shy, but has never been agressive towards me.

Hi, My name is Casper and I am a Burman cat and I came to live with this guy when I was nearly 5 years old. I was a little spun out when I first discovered my housemates, but I have gotten used to Zen and we get on quite well.