The king cobra, or hamadryad (lat. Ophiophagus hannah) belongs to the family Elapidae. It is the largest venomous reptile on our planet. The length of the record holder who lived at the London Zoo was 571 cm, and the weight reached 9 kg.
The name of the monotypic genus Ophiophagus is translated from Greek into Russian as “snake eater”. They form the basis of the diet of this reptile. According to molecular genetic studies, it is closer to (Bungarus), mambas (Dendroaspis) and African spotted adders (Elapsoidea) than to other cobras.
The origin of such family ties still remains a mystery and does not have a reliable convincing explanation.
Spreading
The king cobra is found throughout much of South and Southeast Asia. It is distributed in India, Bangladesh, Myanmar, Thailand, Cambodia, India, Vietnam, Malaysia, Hong Kong and the Chinese provinces of Guangxi, Hainan, Yunnan and Sichuan.
In Indonesia, the reptile is found on the islands of Sumatra, Borneo, Sulawesi, Bali, Java, Banka, Mentawai, and in the Philippines on the islands of Mindanao, Mindoro, Negros, Palawan, Balabac and Luzon. In India, the largest populations are observed in the states of Karnataka, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, located in the south of the country.
The northern border of the range runs at the foot of the Himalayan mountains. Hamadryad prefers to settle in humid tropical forests nearby ponds and mangrove swamps. IN mountainous area adapted to existence at altitudes up to 2000 m above sea level.
IN last years the reptile increasingly chooses the outskirts for its place of residence settlements, where rodents and rat snakes (Elaphe) prey on them are found in abundance. The latter are among his favorite victims.
The species was first described in 1836 by Danish zoologist Theodor Edward Cantor as Hamadryas hannah.
King cobra venom
The reptile is one of the most dangerous poisonous snakes. Her poison is not as strong as that of Indian cobra(Naja naja), but represents mortal danger for the victim due to the large dose. At one time, she is capable of injecting more than 2 teaspoons of toxins into the victim’s body, piercing fangs 12-15 mm long into it. The amount of injected poison is regulated by the snake and the dry residue ranges from 102 to 420 mg.
The lethal dose is 0.34 mg per 1 kg of victim. Cases of death of adult elephants 3 hours after being bitten have been recorded.
Hamadryad venom primarily affects nervous system. Acute pain and swelling appears at the site of the bite, followed by necrosis. Almost instantly, dizziness, blurred vision, loss of speech and drowsiness occur, soon ending in paralysis. The victim's cardiovascular system is disrupted and she falls into a coma.
Death can often occur within 20 minutes of the bite king cobra due to respiratory arrest, but usually after 2-10 hours.
Its venom has no effect on members of its own species, but is fatal to all other snakes.
Not all asp attacks on humans are fatal. In 50-60% of cases, he does not inject poison into the victim’s body, but even then it is necessary to administer the antidote as quickly as possible and provide qualified medical care. In Thailand, the local population effectively uses compresses made from a mixture of alcohol and roots (Curcuma) to reduce the effect of neurotoxic toxins.
Behavior
The king cobra leads a predominantly terrestrial lifestyle, but is very good at climbing trees, especially when young. Activity occurs at any time of the day as hunger sets in, more often during the day. A well-fed reptile rests in its lair, which is most often located in burrows or caves. In search of food, it can crawl tens of kilometers.
The snake is very aggressive and moves relatively quickly. It is almost impossible for its usual victims to escape from it. She swims well and can catch up with fleeing prey in the water. The cobra bites her and waits until she dies or becomes immobile. The wait takes 10-30 minutes.
During an attack, reptiles raise their heads high above the ground and are even able to crawl in this position. This characteristic pose also helps them in sorting out relationships. The reptile strives to touch the top of the enemy's head. As a rule, this is enough for him to admit defeat and crawl away.
This species has no natural enemies in its natural habitat. Only (Herpestes edwardsi) can challenge it. Danger awaits only very young snakes, which can become a hunting trophy for birds of prey or their older relatives.
The daily menu includes small and medium-sized snakes, and to a lesser extent lizards. Hamadryads, as a rule, ignore mammals. For this reason, keeping them in zoos is associated with certain difficulties. Even very hungry individuals usually refuse to eat rats and mice offered to them.
Reproduction
Puberty occurs after the age of 5 years. King cobras breed in most regions of their range all year round. In India, egg laying occurs most often from April to June.
A fertilized female lays from 20 to 40 eggs measuring about 65x33 mm in a pre-prepared nest located in a hard-to-reach place.
The nest can reach a height of up to 1 m. It is constructed from leaves and other soft plant fragments.
The female covers the clutch with her body throughout the incubation period, which lasts 80-120 days, and only occasionally leaves if necessary. She defends her very aggressively and attacks anyone who comes within close range. Shortly before the hatching of the offspring, the mother leaves the nest and crawls away from it. This way she gets rid of the temptation to feast on her own offspring.
The babies hatch fully formed, with a characteristic hood on the back of the head and poison glands. Their body length is 50-53 cm. They are already able to take care of themselves and have a sufficient supply of poison to inflict a fatal bite. Baby snakes are ready for defense and attack already at the moment of their birth.
Description
The average length of adult individuals is 380-450 cm, and their weight is about 6 kg. Approximately a fifth of the total length is in the tail. The main color background depends on the surrounding landscape; olive-brown, yellowish-brown, brown, black-brown and almost black shades predominate.
Whitish or yellowish transverse stripes are clearly visible throughout the body, which become more faded as they grow older.
The throat and front of the neck are yellow-orange or yellowish-white. The belly is whitish or gray-white. The head is relatively small and only slightly separated from the body. The iris is dark brown or black, the pupils have round shape. The mouth is very wide.
The male is larger than the female, which is rare among snakes.
The lifespan of king cobras is about 30 years. They continue to grow until they die.
Cobra belongs to the class of reptiles.
The body of an ordinary cobra reaches one and a half meters. It is covered with scales of a gray uniform color. But there is the largest of this class - the king cobra. Its length reaches five meters. Cobras live in forest-steppe and semi-desert landscapes. Cobras are diurnal snakes. They hunt only during the day. Their food includes lizards, birds, frogs, small snakes and rodents. In case of danger, cobras can hide in rodent burrows. They spend the winter in these burrows.
IN hot weather To cool off, the cobra crawls onto the branches of trees and bushes or into holes. Cobra is a poisonous snake. Its bite can be fatal. Cobra venom acts primarily on all nerve endings, paralyzing the respiratory system, and this, in turn, can lead to death. If a person who has been bitten by a cobra does not take action, he will die in just a few hours. The cobra is considered treacherous and aggressive. But, before attacking the victim, the snake takes on a terrifying appearance: it inflates its ribs in the head area, forming a kind of hood (this is a distinctive feature), and hisses loudly. First, the cobra, as it were, warns its enemy - it lunges with its head to do this, thus trying to scare him away. Then he bites.
Snake venom is used in medicinal practice. He has a number beneficial properties Therefore, medicinal painkillers are prepared from it. Many cobras, for example the Central Asian cobra, are listed in the Red Book.
A selection of cobra photos
Ophiophagus hannah (Cantor, )
| Taxonomy on Wikispecies |
Images on Wikimedia Commons |
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Life expectancy is more than 30 years. Grows throughout life.
The king cobra stands out as an independent genus Ophiophagus belonging to the subfamily Elapinae family of asps ( Elapidae).
Lifestyle and behavior
King cobras like to hide in caves and burrows, and also crawl into trees. Some snakes prefer a specific territory, but some can move tens of kilometers (which was established through tracking using implanted radio beacons).
King cobras can raise their heads vertically up to the front third of their body, and they are also capable of locomotion in this position. When one king cobra meets another, it tries to touch the top of its head to show its dominance, and the snake it touches immediately ducks and crawls away.
King cobras often live near humans. The reason is that in Asia, large-scale agricultural production has led to a significant reduction in the tropical forests in which king cobras live; at the same time, the crops attract rodents, the rodents attract relatively small snakes, and these, in turn, make up the diet of the king cobra.
I
The king cobra regulates the flow of venom during an attack by closing the ducts of the poisonous glands through muscle contractions. The amount of poison depends on the size of the victim and is usually almost an order of magnitude higher than the lethal dose. The neurotoxin of its venom does not affect the snake itself, and it does not get poisoned when eating a victim it has poisoned.
Most often, in an attempt to scare away a person, the snake makes “idle” bites, without injecting any poison at all. Apparently, this is due to the fact that the cobra needs venom primarily for hunting, and accidental or unnecessary loss of venom is undesirable.
King cobra venom is primarily neurotoxic. The venom toxin blocks muscle contractions, which causes paralysis of the respiratory muscles, respiratory arrest and death. Its strength and volume (up to 7 ml) are enough to cause the death of a person within 15 minutes after the first full bite. In such cases, the probability of death may exceed 75%. But, taking into account all the behavioral features of the king cobra, in general, only 10% of bites become fatal to humans. However, there have been cases when even Indian elephants died three to four hours after a king cobra bite if the bite was applied to the end of the trunk or to the fingers (the only parts of the elephant’s body that are vulnerable to snake bites).
In India, deaths from king cobra bites are rare, despite the fact that up to 50 thousand people die from poisonous snake bites in the country every year.
Nutrition
In nature, the king cobra feeds mainly on other species of snakes, including highly poisonous ones, for which it received its scientific name - Ophiophagus hannah(“snake eater”) It often attacks snakes that are already hunting someone. Sometimes it kills and, having killed, swallows small monitor lizards.
It can go without food for about three months - the time during which the female continuously guards the clutch of eggs.
Shedding
The king cobra molts 4 to 6 times a year. Molting lasts about 10 days. After molting, it becomes vulnerable and, in search of a secluded and warm place, can crawl into a person’s home, thereby causing a lot of disturbance to its inhabitants.
Defensive behavior
Defending itself and making frightening lunges in the direction of the person or animal that disturbed it, the king cobra is capable of making characteristic barking sounds, using the not very large capabilities of its respiratory apparatus. Among snakes, along with the king cobra, only the Indian rat snake is capable of making sounds through breathing movements.
Reproduction
When confronted on the same territory, males can engage in ritual fights with each other, but they do not bite each other. The winning male remains near the female. Moreover, if the female has already been impregnated by another male, there are often cases when the winning male attacks the female and kills her, after which he devours her. If it is not possible to completely absorb the killed female due to its large size, it regurgitates it.
Mating is preceded by a short courtship of the male, during which he makes sure that the female does not pose a danger to him (the female can also attack the male and kill him). After this, mating occurs, which lasts about an hour.
After copulation, the female will be ready to lay eggs in about a month. At this time, she builds a nest for eggs, which is completely uncharacteristic of other snakes. The nest is built on a small hill so that in the event of flooding during tropical rainstorms it will not be inundated. It is a heap of rotting forest litter about a meter across, into which the female lays from 20 to 40 eggs, and subsequently constantly maintains a temperature of 26 to 28℃, increasing or decreasing the heap. This ensures optimal temperature regime development of eggs due to decay of vegetation.
Incubation is about 100 days.
Females always guard the clutch, becoming very aggressive and attacking anyone who approaches the nest - from small animals to elephants and humans. At this time, the toxicity of the female’s venom increases, and even an elephant can die as a result of her attack.
Shortly before the cubs hatch, the female leaves the nest and goes in search of food so as not to eat her own offspring.
After hatching, the young stay near the nest for about a day, eating the remaining yolk of the eggs. The cubs are already highly venomous, but are nonetheless very vulnerable and are often targeted by larger predators. Ultimately, only 1 or 2 specimens out of 25 survive to adulthood.
Features of keeping in captivity
King cobras are rarely kept in zoos due to their aggressiveness; in addition, it is rarely possible to switch king cobras to feeding on rats when kept in captivity. It is even more rare to be able to separate them.
Notes
Sources
- Movie "The Mysteries of the King Cobra"
- Film "Dangerous Encounters: Deadly Encounters"
Links
- The Reptile Database: Ophiophagus hannah(English)
Categories:
- Vulnerable species
- Animals in alphabetical order
- Asps
- Reptiles of Asia
- Animals described in 1836
- Monotypic genera of reptiles
Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.
See what "King Cobra" is in other dictionaries:
Hamadryad (Ophiophagus hannah), snake of the family. aspidae; unities, kind of genus. The world's largest venomous snake. up to 5.5 m. Color from plain olive to yellow-green, with black oblique stripes, wider and more distinct on the back of the body.… … Biological encyclopedic dictionary
Niramin - Dec 7th, 2015
The king cobra lives in the tropical latitudes of South, Southeast and East Asia. This huge poisonous snake prefers to settle near water bodies, in abandoned gardens, in dense jungles and on overgrown plantations. Sometimes it settles down near human habitation, choosing old abandoned buildings where a lot of garbage accumulates.
This is not to say that the king cobra looks like an ordinary snake. First of all, this reptile is characterized by its enormous size. It can reach a length of more than 5 meters and weigh about 9 kg. The poisonous fangs of a snake can reach up to 1.5 cm in length. A distinctive feature of the king cobra is its hood, on which large dark shields can be seen. The snake reveals it in case of danger or before an attack. The snake's body is brown or greenish-brown with alternating darker rings.
In Latin, the name of the king cobra sounds like “snake eater.” Indeed, this snake feeds on smaller snakes, among which rat snakes are a favorite food. It is worth noting that the menu of this poisonous reptile also includes poisonous snakes, for which the king cobra has gained love and reverence among Hindus. In addition to snakes, the cobra's diet includes rodents and large lizards.
Thanks to its potent venom, the snake quickly dispatches its prey. During a bite, she literally spits out up to 7 ml of a deadly substance that can kill even an elephant.
It is interesting that the king cobra, unlike most of its relatives, builds a nest, lays eggs there and literally hatches its future cubs. During this period, the snake poses the greatest danger. Defending her nest, she can attack anyone, even a person. In addition, the cobra is capable of pursuing an enemy, quickly moving along the ground, trees and, swimming, quickly overcoming a water barrier.
The king cobra is considered sacred in India. Therefore, if you kill this snake unnecessarily, you can get a prison sentence of up to 3 years.
See interesting photos of the king cobra:
King cobras care for their young. 
Deadly number. 
Photo: King Cobra. 
Video: King cobra (lat. Ophiophagus hannah)
Video: Mongoose vs King Cobra. Deathmatch
Video: King Cobra snake killer
Video: King Cobra in India
KING COBRA - SNAKE KILLER
The largest of all venomous snakes in the world is not without reason called the king cobra. The average size of an adult is three to four meters, but there are individual specimens reaching a length of five and a half meters. This poisonous monster can be found in India, Southern China, Malaysia and Indonesia, the Greater Sunda Islands and the Philippines. The king cobra prefers remote areas of the jungle, covered with dense undergrowth or tall grass, but sometimes appears in residential villages. It is very easy to recognize: on the king cobra’s head behind the back of the head there are six large scutes arranged in a semicircle. The body of the snake, which has a yellowish-green color, is surrounded by black rings, vague and narrow near the head and clearer and wider closer to the tail.
The snake itself has a rather nasty character and an unpleasant habit of chasing its opponent when he tries to escape. The king cobra is an excellent swimmer and excellent tree climber, making it very difficult to hide from it. True, the aggressiveness of the snake is simply explained. Most often, her attacks are associated with protecting a nest with eggs. Travelers who encounter a king cobra in the jungle and are forced to shoot it or flee for their lives talk about the reptile's seemingly causeless attack. However, they may not realize that they were actually passing by a snake's nest.
Yes, oddly enough, the king cobra is the only snake that builds a nest for its offspring. The cobra uses its body to rake grass and dry leaves into a pile until it forms a low, round cushion. Having laid eggs there (usually from twenty to forty pieces), the snake settles on top and “hatches” them like a real bird. Sometimes the female is replaced by the father of the offspring, just like the mother, ready at any moment to take off and punish anyone passing by, be it a person or an animal.
True, after the birth of baby snakes, parents stop all care of them. But small cobras do not need protection and with early childhood are able to provide their own food.
In India, the king cobra is treated with great reverence. One reason is that the cobra feeds mainly on snakes. Along with harmless snakes, its diet includes kraits, whose poison is the most terrible in the world, and ordinary cobras. That is why the king cobra was given a scientific name, which translates as “snake eater”.
sacred reptile
As already mentioned, despite the terrible danger this snake poses, Hindus idolize the king cobra. The seven-headed king cobra Shesh Naga serves as a bed and protection for the god Vishnu. Very often in temples there are images of Vishnu standing under the open hood of this giant cobra. IN long hair The god Shiva is also woven with figures of small snakes - symbols of his magical power and wisdom. Indians say that the king cobra is the only snake that understands sacred spells - mantras. This snake has purity and holiness, and it is called upon to bring wealth to the house and protect it from enemies.
The appearance of a king cobra in a temple is a sacred event. So, in September 2005, a white king cobra crawled into one of the Hindu temples in Malaysia during a service and wrapped itself around the statue of one of the saints. The parishioners took the appearance of the albino snake as a sign from above, and the temple immediately organized offerings of food and drink for the cobra and even cash to benefit the temple. The snake “stayed” for several days and during this time the sanctuary was visited by more than four thousand pilgrims.
King cobras are protected in India not only by religion, but also by secular decrees. In 1972, the government passed a law prohibiting the unnecessary killing of cobras. The offender faces imprisonment for up to three years. Special reserves for reptiles have been opened in the central and southern parts of the country. And in 2002, a special clinic even opened in India to treat wild snakes injured in the jungle.
Snake celebrations
Once a year, Hindus hold a king cobra festival. We have already written about it, it is called Nag-panchami. So, on this day there is universal worship of nagas - king cobras. Hindus bring snakes from the forest, release them in temples and right on the streets, feed them honey and other sweets and give them milk to drink. People wrap snakes around their heads, hang them around their necks, and wrap them around their arms. And what’s most interesting: not a single snake even tries to bite someone. But they also do more risky things with them. For example, men compete to see whose snake is longer. They take the reptile by the tail, use a stick to hook the cobra under the base of the hood and pull it high up. The one with the highest snake head will win. And all this is done not with harmless snakes, but with real king cobras, freshly brought from the jungle. Indians firmly believe in the legend, repeatedly confirmed by practice, that on the Nag Panchami holiday snakes do not bite anyone.
At the end of the celebration, the residents carefully take the tired cobras back to the jungle and begin to fear them again, until the next holiday.
If the cobra itself comes to a residential building as an uninvited guest, then they do not kill it, but try to appease it with offerings and persuade it not to harm the residents. During periods of heavy rains, cobras tend to leave the jungle and hide in people's houses. When one of the villages is subjected to such an invasion, the residents abandon their homes and turn to the nearest snake charmer for help, so that he would relieve people from this scourge painlessly for the cobras. And in some rich houses, king cobras constantly live as pets - favorites of the whole family and excellent guards. Domestic cobras perfectly distinguish their owners from strangers, and while they can allow their own to be treated fairly freely, it is best for uninvited strangers to stay away from them.
