Beautiful Forest cobra from the Congo River

Re: Beautiful Forest cobra from the Congo River

Postby WW » Wed Apr 11, 2012 11:56 pm

Stunning! What a beautiful snake. Definitely a "must see in the wild before I die" kind of snake! Gorgeous!
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Re: Beautiful Forest cobra from the Congo River

Postby Warren Klein » Wed Jun 13, 2012 5:28 pm

WOULD YOU BELIVE IT, I FOUND ANOTHER ONE!!

This time it's a male and he was captured less than 1km from where the 1st female was found. I have been catching Forest cobras in this area for nearly 7 years now and have never found specimens which look like this before, so I was obviously excited to find two specimens which look so similar within 2 months of each other. Enjoy!

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Re: Beautiful Forest cobra from the Congo River

Postby Bushviper » Wed Jun 13, 2012 6:03 pm

I like that hood marking its got. Lovely specimen.
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Re: Beautiful Forest cobra from the Congo River

Postby Mitton » Wed Jun 13, 2012 6:41 pm

Wow, really nice find, great pics too.
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Re: Beautiful Forest cobra from the Congo River

Postby Eyelash » Wed Jun 13, 2012 10:23 pm

Great pics man and a stunning snake ! I love that marking and the "zebra" face !

Thanks for sharing him with us.

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Re: Beautiful Forest cobra from the Congo River

Postby Sico » Thu Jun 14, 2012 7:02 am

Really Awesome snakes Warren! Thanks!
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Re: Beautiful Forest cobra from the Congo River

Postby Warren Klein » Thu Jun 14, 2012 7:47 am

Thanks for everyone’s nice comments. It would have been great to breed these two snakes and make more monocled Forest cobras. I released them both in the same area so hopefully they will meet up one day naturally.

One interesting thing I noted about these two pretty specimens with the hood marking and orange colour was that they both shamed death with little harassment. I have quite a bit of experience with Forest cobras both in northern KZN SA and northern Angola but I have never observed them to sham death before and these two specimens both did it quite easily almost like a rinkhals would. Has anyone out there ever known Forest cobras to sham before?

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Re: Beautiful Forest cobra from the Congo River

Postby Sico » Thu Jun 14, 2012 8:21 am

Can't say I've seen it before in any of them that I have encountered in East Africa, they either stood their ground without backing down at all (definitely not as calm looking as the ones you have pictured) or they really were dead. It would be awesome to breed these and see what the next generation looks like. Have you got some DNA samples?
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Re: Beautiful Forest cobra from the Congo River

Postby Warren Klein » Thu Jun 14, 2012 9:57 am

I would definitely not call these cobras "calm" as such. They would still strike and rush forward etc, but then would sham death once they felt they were not winning the fight. Yes, I always collect DNA samples from my captures.
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Re: Beautiful Forest cobra from the Congo River

Postby Bushviper » Fri Jun 15, 2012 3:38 pm

Wow another cobra shamming death. I thought it was rare but it seems as if a number of cobras (and Rinkhals) employ this form or evasion. Very interesting observation.
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Re: Beautiful Forest cobra from the Congo River

Postby Kev » Sat Jun 16, 2012 8:07 pm

All I can say is wow... what stunning specimens!
Great find.
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Re: Beautiful Forest cobra from the Congo River

Postby WW » Sun Jun 17, 2012 10:38 am

A stunning specimen indeed!

I have certainly never heard of death shamming in this species, their reputation tends more in the opposite direction....
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Re: Beautiful Forest cobra from the Congo River

Postby Mr S » Mon Jun 18, 2012 2:48 pm

You are a pioneer in the quest for ultimate herp understanding

If you were not out there poking and playing we would have never known about these awesome markings, let alone the shaming defense strategy.

Send me some of those pleeeeeeeeeeeeeease boet

I will look in my literature and old books to see if anybody has ever witnessed what you so brilliantly have documented

Imagine how much more we can learn if you send me some of those- i have already got permits!!!!!!!!!
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Re: Beautiful Forest cobra from the Congo River

Postby Warren Klein » Tue Jun 19, 2012 9:16 am

Thanks for everyone’s further comments. I think we can all agree that these are two stunning examples of Naja melanoleuca and specimens like these would be highly desired among elapid lovers. I think I should mention that there have actually been 3 specimens with the bright yellow/orange and hood marking found here. My back to back (alternate) nyami on the forum, captured the 1st specimen over a year ago. I will ask him to also post it here under this thread. Besides the wow factor of these cobras, the most interesting thing to me is that they shammed death so easily. It would have been interesting to find out if the first specimen which nyami captured would have also exhibited this death shamming behavior. Maybe he just did not muck with the cobra as much as i did as he never observed this behavior. The Forest cobra is by far the most common venomous snake which we find here and out of all the specimens captured (in nearly 7 years) it has only been the bright ones with the hood marking which sham death.
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