Heya! Afraid? You don’t have to be! We are Indian Rock Pythons. We are very big nonvenomous snakes and actually, we are afraid of you.
You must know the famous movie “The Jungle Book”. The big long snake named “Kaa” in the movie was an Indian Rock Python. Is it not interesting? Want to know more? There are so many things you can know about us.
Here are a few:
- We are big and long. The longest of us measured about 4.6 meters and weighed 137kg.Yes, we are very heavy.
- Please don’t disturb us when we have eaten to our heart’s content, we might vomit.
- Since we are strong, we surround and hold our prey and crush them and then feed on them.
- We don’t have jaws and thus, we can swallow very big prey easily.
- We can hunt in the night too; we use our heat sensors and chemical receptors to identify the prey’s location.
- The interesting thing about us is, we can live without food for weeks, sometimes even months.
- Do you know? Our existence is near threatened as we are killed for our skin and also, we are killed by big predators. Conservation procedures are actually helping us maintain our population and grow.
SOME QUICK FACTS:
Our Scientific Name: Python Molurus.
Our Identification: Big, long and yellowish snake with dark brown to reddish-brown patches on the body.
Our Habitat: mammal burrows, dense water reeds, hollow trees, and mangrove thickets.
Our Range:
Our Food habits: Carnivorous, and feed on birds, reptiles and mammals.
Our Incubation Period: 2-3 months
Number of eggs laid: about 100
Lifespan: 15.8 years
IUCN red list status: Near Threatened
CITES: Appendix I and Appendix II
Indian Wildlife Protection Act, 1972: Schedule I
Scientific Classification:
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Reptilia
Order: Squamata
Suborder: Serpentes
Family: Pythonidae
Genus: Python
Species: P. Molurus
COMPLETE DETAILS ABOUT US FOR ANIMAL ENTHUSIASTS:
We are Indian Rock Python, a big, nonvenomous snake. Let us tell you about ourselves.
We are scientifically called as Python Molurus.
How We Look:
We are long snakes measuring 2.5m-3m long and weighing 50kg-100kg.
We are usually yellowish white in color with blotched patterns and patches that are in dark brown to reddish-brown in color. This color of ours vary from place to place.
We have properly arranged small and sharp teeth which are in reverse saw shaped which doesn’t allow the prey to escape from our mouth.
Males and females of our species look alike. Young ones look similar to adults.
We Are Found In:
We prefer living where there is abundance of water. Sometimes we are also found in habitats like mammal burrows, dense water reeds, hollow trees, and mangrove thickets.
Our range lies in India, Sri Lanka, Bhutan, Nepal, Pakistan, and Bangladesh and probably in the north of Myanmar.
What We Eat:
We are Carnivores. We usually eat birds, reptiles and mammals. But most of the times we prefer mammals compared to other forms of food. If we see any prey, they usually attack them. We use our bending nature of our tail to hold the prey tight until it stops breathing and eventually dies. We swallow the whole prey with its headfirst like any other pythons.
After a heavy meal, we won’t move. If anything forces us to move, food eaten may tear some parts of our body. In urgent cases, we may spew out the eaten food in order to escape from predators.
We can eat food bigger than our diameter because the jaw bones are not connected. Moreover, the prey cannot escape from our mouth because our mouth structure and arrangement are built so as not to allow prey to get out.
Our Reproduction:
We, like birds, fishes, and amphibians lay eggs with little or no other embryonic development. The female can lay eggs up to 100 at once and these eggs are protected by the female.
Using muscular contractions, the female can raise the temperature above the ambient levels for its eggs. Hatchlings come out after incubation period of about 2-3 months and when they come out, they are 40 to 60 cm long. Our average lifespan is 15.8 years.
More About Us:
The longest of us measured about 4.6 meters and weighed 137kg.
Since we are strong, we surround and hold our prey and crush them and then feed on them.
We don’t have jaws and thus, we can swallow very big prey easily.
We can live without food for weeks, sometimes even months.
Our Conservation:
Due to habitat destruction and extreme killing, we are “near threatened” species under the IUCN Red List, listed as Appendix I and II in CITES and also listed as schedule I in Indian wildlife Protection Act, 1972.
Pic Credits: Bagheera.com
