Kingbrowns (Pseudechis australis)

Taxonomical note:

            Just like most of the Elapid snakes of Irian Jaya and Papua New Guinea , this species is still under research. In 2000, Raymond Hoser described this species as a new species in the genus Pailsus. He had previously described this new genus based on a specimen found in the Queensland , Australia , which he named Pailsus pailsei (Hoser, 1998). In 2000 he published a paper on a new species of the Pailsus genus found in Papua New Guinea and Irian Jaya (former Dutch New Guinea), named Pailsus rossignolii. Hoser described this snake on the basis of a holotype preserved in the Museum Zoologicum Bogoriense, Bogor , Indonesia . The description was based on a brief e-mail from a contact at the Museum. All the information given on the article of A New Species of Snake from Irian Jaya by Raymond Hoser in December 2000 is really doubtful due to lack of scientific proof and research. In this article, we will speak of Pseudechis australis till proven differently.

More information on taxonomy of this species can be found on the website of Wolfgang Wüster BA, Ph.D. Phylogeny and classification of Australo-Papuan black snakes and mulga snakes: comments on genus Pailsus Hoser, 1998

Zoological Description:

            The head is not clearly distinct form the neck. The head is broad and a little bit flattened with a stumpy nose. The eyes are small. The tail is reasonably short. When threatened are Kingbrowns able to flatten their neck like we know from several different Elapid snakes. This flattening of the neck not comparable with the genus Naja because they don’t have a hood and are not able to stand up like a real cobra.  

Length:

            My adult animals are all between 90-118 cm in length and wild caught specimens from the Merauke area. Exact sizes can be seen in  table 1.1. In my personal opinion is that they don’t grow bigger than this size. Mark O’Shea describes in his book A Guide To The Snakes Of Papua New Guinea that they grow to a size between 244-275 cm, which is probably based on the Australian Kingbrown. All Irian Jaya specimens that I have seen were no bigger than 110 cm. I really think this is a maximum size for these snakes especially because I bred them on this size. Females seem to be build more strongly than males that always look quite slender in compare to t he females.

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Table 1.1 Sizes from Wild caught adult breeding kingbrowns

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 Colour:

            The dorsal colour of the Kingbrown can be very variable but is always uniform trough out the body. I have seen different colours of the animals varying from olive brown to reddish brown. The ventral side is much paler and can be yellowish cream. Some specimens can have a paler head, which also can be grey or yellowish cream in colour. The colour from the belly is most of the time paler than the dorsal colour but can also be crèmes or grey. Some ventral scales can have small darker dots on them but is not seen often. The rostral scale can be pinkish or flesh coloured but this comes true there digging and rubbing nature. The scales on the head are often seen with wide space between them which shows the flesh colour in between the scales. The eye of the kingbrown is orange with a large round black pupil. The tongue is mostly black but I have seen specimens with a pinkish coloured tongue.

 Scalation:

            The scale-counts given in both tables are counted on 6 individual kingbrown snake with a equal sex rate from 3:3 (3 ♀ + 3 ♀). Any information found in the literature on the Irian Jaya Kingbrown gave only scale count information of the Kingbrown of mainland Australia . The scales from are smooth.

 Tabel 2.1 Headscalation of the Irian jaya Kingbrown (Pseudechis australis)

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Tabel 2.2 Body scalation of the Irian jaya Kingbrown (Pseudechis australis)

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Kingbrowns in the Wild: 

            Not much is known about these wonderfull creatures in the wild. They are only known from two areas in Southeastern Irian Jaya in the vicinity of Etna bay and the Merauke area. They are not recorded yet in Papua New Guinea but are possibly present in the Western Province west of the Fly river and in the Morehead/Bensbach region near the frontier with Irian Jaya. Parker (1982).

The kingbrowns in Irian jaya live in the savanna and savanna woodlands where it feeds on lizards, frogs and small mammals.

Kingbrowns are diurnal but can get nocturnal to avoid the heat of the day.

Venom:

            There is little known about the venom of the Irian Jaya Kingbrown, although venom studies on the venom showed its haemolytic, cytotoxic and weakly neurotoxic and myotoxic.

No specific antivenom is produced against a bite of this species but CSL Monovalent Blacksnake antivenom, and Polyvalent Papua New Guinea and Australia should neutralize the venom.

Kingbrowns in captivity:

            The Irian Jaya Kingbrown is not a snake that is kept allot in captivity most people think that they are quite plain snakes that are to nervous, quick and dangerous to keep. Also the colour of these snakes is not that spectacular and is often called boring. Another reason is that the species is not always available because many of the Indonesian reptile exporters do not deal with them or have there trappers in the area where the species occur.

In my opinion are these snakes my favourites because of there behaviour. They are active animals that can make me laugh every now and than, they try to climb to the most impossible places in there enclosure but are not build to clime and fall down easily. New objects in there enclosure can keep them busy for hours in a row.

Behavioural notes from specimens in captivity:

            In my personal experience, there is a major difference between the behaviour of the Kingbrowns from Irian Jaya and Papua New Guinea compared to their cousins from mainland Australia . First, there is their panicking way of moving when approached: they flatten their neck immediately when someone comes too close to their enclosures. They lift up their body for about 5 cm and move their head and neck in a sort of banded and sloping position, while keeping the rest of their body straight. From this position, they strike and are capable of jumping with almost their whole body length in the direction of the threat. When kept for some time they will quiet down when not moving to fast when I’amclose to there cage When handling these animals, quick reaction is necessary. They do not stay on the hook and slide off quickly, by tailing them they start thrashing around and will bite everything they can get and which they hold on to. I also noticed that when handling these snakes by the tail they don’t come up to your hand, but are just busy trying to escape When I need to pin these snakes I noticed that they start dribbling venom without giving the venom glands a massage.

The Kingbrowns are day active, and when left alone, they crawl around the whole day in search of food. They are also quite curious and every new object in the enclosure is well inspected by them. For this reason I think that these snakes need a well decorated enclosure which keeps them busy. I feed my Kingbrowns mostly dead prey items (defrosted or pre-killed mice or small rats). When feeding on live mice or rats, they attack fiercely and really hunt their prey down with multiple bites, some of them even hold on to their prey even when it bites the snake. I have seen this before on a few specimens that gave a bite in a snake bag or a hook and just held on for several minutes. I have even seen a Kingbrown striking the glass and than getting hold of a piece of tree root, which he didn’t let go for quite some time.

I bought my first Kingbrown in October 1997 from a German snake collector, who didn’t want this animal any more because of its aggression. He also told me that he was bitten by it three times without the animal injecting venom. After all these years of keeping these snakes, I think this is really strange because I have seen doing them strange things.

I keep my Kingbrowns together even when looked at their cousins of the mainland Australia that are known to be ophiophagh (snake eating). I never had problems with them biting each other or even getting hold of the same prey item. I also have seen that a prey bitten by one specimen is not taken by another specimen. But on all rules are exceptions and one female ate there male after not being fed for 2 months. In my idea was this female to fat and after several clutches of eggs that were not fertile I decided to put her on a diet. Obliviously she didn’t like this at all and decided to eat the male, which she regurgitates a few days later.

Captive care:

            Kingbrowns are active animals that need their space. I keep my animals paired for most of the year I only separate them a few months a year to give them a extra feed before I want them to mate. I keep my Kingbrowns in enclosures from 100 x 50 x 50 cm. I use a mixture of sand with plant and potting soil as a substrate. I keep this substrate dry and only spray it with water when it gets dusty. I also have a big bowl in the enclosure with a moisture substrate that helps the animals to shed and to lay their eggs in. I also provide the snakes with a big water bowl that they use a lot to take a bath. As decoration I use plastic plants and bark.

The enclosure is heated with a 60 watt spotlight and in night time with a 5 watt heat pad under the bowl with moisture substrate; this keeps the humidity at night reasonably high and gives a sort of dew in the morning when the heating lights go on. The temperature in the enclosures is in daytime around 28-31⁰C at night the temperature drops by about 5⁰C. The average humidity in day time is around 60%. Kingbrowns kept on a temperature that is too low can get problems with shedding even when the humidity level is good. 

Breeding:

            All information in this chapter is purly based on my own experience on the internet and in the literature I could find any information on breeding of the kingbrowns from Irian Jaya.

Kingbrowns are oviparous and lay probably 4-14 eggs. In captivity, they will breed the whole year round. Looking at my own breeding experience, I think the average time between mating and laying the eggs is around 65 – 76 days, which is quite long. I hatched the eggs in a dry incubator on vermiculite at 27-29⁰C 24 hours a day. I kept the eggs humid by sprinkling them with water if necessary. They hatched after 61-75 days, my personal opinion is that this can be very different but this is probable depending on the time of the year.

In two tables I show the process from two individual pairs in the year 2000.

   _{Tabel 3.1. winter mating}

Tabel 3.2. Summer mating

Nothing is done specially to get the animals to breed. I keep the animals more humid some months than others, but there is no structure in this. In the year 2001 I had several matings but no eggs were laid. A good reason for this can I not give, but there is a chance that the females that have laid eggs will take a year of and will produce they year after that again, more details will be updated from my side as soon as I have more information and breeding results.

I never have weight or measured the eggs, but the size of the eggs is quite similar in size to that of a corn snake (Elaphe guttata). The eggs are bright white in colour and do not stick together. The hatchlings have a average size of  10 – 12 cm, some of them will slough after 9 – 11 days when after I offered them food. I first tried to feed them with life baby mice which they kill but not eat. I also offered them crickets and small grasshoppers that some of them will accept as food, the other where force fed with little strokes of cow heart. Juvenile kingbrowns grow fairly quick and reach a size of 35 – 50 cm in there first year, all juveniles that stayed alive accepted live baby mice after they reached a size of 18 – 20 cm and had some more solid bodies.

Last note:

            Kingbrowns are not snakes for beginner snakes or venomous snake keepers, in my opinion can they be placed in the same list of mambas, taipans, and other big Elapid snakes.   

Copyright©2002 Richard Mastenbroek

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This page is not build to stimulate people to keep venomous snakes. All Captive information given on this page is based on own experience