Ophiophagus hannah:

An experience in captive care and husbandry

By Sierra

This article is based on my personal experience. I initially started into herps as a little girl (neonate if you will), collecting any frog, lizard or snake I could find (yep, I was and still am a tom-boy, much to the dislike of my parents). I have been into venomous reptiles now for about 14 years and we have been licensed by the state of Florida for the past 8 years. Herps are a real passion with us. My King Cobra experience entails both hatchlings and adults; both wild caught “from the bush” and captive born animals. We started our experience with King Cobras in the early 90's and have had at least a dozen since then as well as one successful-breeding in 2001. It should be noted that Kings can each be unique in their behavior, especially with regards to feeding and I suspect that initiating breeding can vary among them as well. I am not the most scientific person and not exactly a herpetologist, so do forgive me if my article isn't totally professional. I actually consider myself a hobbyist and like most I started out on my own. Eventually I did acquire a mentor (who later became my husband) and for the most part we are self-taught. The article is based on our hands on experience and put into our own words. Most keepers are very secretive about the husbandry of their Kings, so I am sorta breaking the unspoken rules here but I feel to best serve the animals and the hobby/profession that info should be shared among us although I, too, was reluctant when first asked to write this article based on the fact that, for most people, I wouldn't suggest owning a King Cobra.

Ophiophagus hannah is one of the most feared and famous creatures on the planet. Nearly every man, woman and child can recognize this majestic animal. The King Cobra's geographic range is from northern India, east to China, including Hong Kong and Hainan, south throughout the Malay peninsula and east to western Indonesia and the Philippines. Due to this large range, Kings display a variety of colors and patterns depending on their locale and individual specimens may even show a unique pattern, anywhere from solid olive coloring to dark (almost black), with or with out banding. Some imports even have varied highlights of orange or yellow. King Cobras are monotypic with no subspecies. In the wild, normal habitat would consist of forest and bamboo thickets to open fields. Due to extensive habitat destruction, tea plantations have become a very popular home to the King Cobra. They are Diurnal, seeking prey both at night and during the day. They have become endangered and protected in much of their range, however they have also become more common in American “hobbyist” collections and are much easier to obtain than they were 5 or 10 years ago. They have a longevity of over twenty years but with more specimens in captivity, I suspect we will find them to live even longer than expected.

Venomous enthusiasts consider it to be one of the most revered additions to their collections. Of course, it is the world's longest venomous snake and can reach lengths of 18 feet with the disputed record to be 19'2” (although 14'-16' seems average for females while males average out around 11'-12'). It can be an intimidating and dramatic acquisition for even the most experienced keeper and should only be kept by those extensively trained to deal with it by another experienced King Cobra keeper. I will never forget my first experience with a large imported Indo King - the loud huffing was unreal and quite shocking. It sent a chill up my spine as I heard that sound when opening the crate. It's meant to intimidate and believe me it does. I was trembling both with excitement and intimidation. Several factors need to be considered when preparing to venture into the keeping of King Cobras. First is your personal experience - I would strongly recommend at least 5 years with various other species before getting your first King. Second is living space - the sheer size of the enclosure needed to house them properly. And lastly the feeding aspect. Hatchlings do well in relatively small cages while adults need large cages and even small room-sized enclosures should be considered for breeding purposes. I have successfully used 12”(for hatchlings/small neonates) through 48” Neodesha cages along with some larger homemade breeding cages. Various substrates may be used such as sphagnum moss or cypress mulch but I have always had success with plain newspaper during the regular caging season. I recently have experienced a death of a Crotalus durissus cumanensis due to impaction from cypress mulch. I have been informed by Dean Ripa that he has had several Lachesis and Bothrops die from this as well - so I would suggest caution when choosing a substrate. I just learned that sphagnum moss may be the ideal choice especially during pre-breeding and nesting.

Our juv. cage setup

Feeding King Cobras, especially hatchlings, can prove difficult and in fact many hatchlings in captivity will die before an inexperienced keeper can persuade them to eat. Different theories on how to best start a baby King are often debated. Some keepers suggest force-feeding with a pinky press and pinkies, but this is not the technique I would suggest as baby Kings are fragile and they can easily be overcome by stress. I have gotten the best success with feeding babies on neonate Elaphe guttata (Red Rat or Corn Snakes) or southern Black Racers (Coluber constrictor priapus). These are easily acquired from several dealers and should be frozen first to kill parasites. Some babies will prefer live while others will take their first meal on a pre-killed and brained Elaphe. Sometimes an injured/bloody prey item is enough stimulate feeding. Larger imports may feed on small Reticulated Pythons (Python reticulatus) or on various monitors (Varanus) but this isn't very practical and you should begin scenting attempts as soon as feeding is established. Also, stuffing prey items with extra mice can help increase the size and nutritional content of the meal. I've also heard of using fish to scent but I have had no personal experience with it. Hatchlings/neonates should be fed once every 7-10 days and adults every 14-28 days depending on individual metabolism. Hatchlings and neonates are very susceptible to respiratory problems so constant temp and airflow/quality must be maintained. I have kept the daytime temps in the range of 74-78 with a max of 80 degrees F. A very minute nighttime drop not below 70 was all I would allow for fear of respiratory distress. Baby Kings, when handled, flail about crazily so care must be taken during any handling or transfer. As a safety precaution, you should always have at least one other “King experienced” person present when handling large King Cobras. Tailing large Kings can be tricky and hand placement at the proper length is critical. Handling can usually be avoided entirely. We have found that shift boxes are the best way to handle King Cobras. They are less stressful to the animal, as well as, safer for the handler. Interlocking shift cages can also be of great benefit. If the snake should happen to defecate in one, merely shift them to the other for very easy cleaning. They also can double as nesting boxes that can make it easy to separate the female from the eggs. We have never even had a close call handling our Kings (knock on wood) due mostly to the shift boxes. The size of our medium shift boxes are 18”x 16”x 6” which will house them for most of their life and if needed, larger ones can be used. A once-a-week misting seemed to be fine for all of my kings with an increase in frequency around shed time. My female nearly always retained an eyecap, which meant either tubing or outright handling/restraining her. When restraining her, a clean damp rag was given to her to chew on while we removed eye-caps, medicated, or while sexing and this trick kept her occupied while we performed any necessary tasks. Kings “jaw-walk ” along and chew, as well as maintaining a tight hold as they inject their venom. Also, it needs to be mentioned that these animals deficate a lot!!! Adequate airflow is critical as well as cleaning the cages often for that reason. They are good climbers as well, so I provide branches for exercise when possible but it's not necessary. Kings are heavy drinkers so provide lots of fresh water. For adults we used a 5-gallon bucket cut down to a four inch depth - it's simple, tip proof and easy to clean. Thermostat controlled heat tape may be used as well but doesn't seem to be necessary.

Here is my biggest King secret that I have to share with you - my own little invention (although I'm sure others have done similar things). I converted all of my Kings to rat feeders with a blended paste of southern Black Racers and canned 9-Lives Supersupper cat food). I simply take a whole adult Black Racer and 2-3 cans of the 9-Lives Supersupper and place it all in a food processor and blend until it's a nice soupy paste - you may need to add a little water to get the right consistency (gross, but hey it works). Although strange and messy, this has never failed for me and has worked for several friends as well. I have shared this technique with individuals over the Internet who have had success with it also. This paste can be frozen in small containers or even an ice-cube tray and thawed as needed. It lasts for quite awhile and certainly saves on feeder snakes. You can merely dip the snout (or depending on the King, the whole prey animal) of a pre-killed rat in the paste. This may work with pinkies and neonate Kings as well but I would suggest establishing a good eating pattern first. Be patient if the switchover takes awhile, you are trying to change the natural instinct of the King and he may be reluctant. You may also have to wash down the prey animal before scenting it to destroy any of the original scent. If you do offer wild caught snakes, you must freeze them for at least two weeks to kill parasites. Imported King Cobras are usually infested with parasites and will need to be treated ASAP. Some very difficult Kings may only feed, at first, on snakes native to their homeland locale, so be prepared to do your homework and spend money to get the feeders. Each King is a little different in that aspect but almost all can eventually be switched over to easily accessible feeder snakes or even rats. The decision to feed rats is a personal one and I have had discussions with several individuals over whether or not Kings should be switched over to rats. I personally have had no problems with feeding them rats which resulted in my keeping King Cobras for many problem-free years. And I don't lose any sleep over whether it is ethical or not to feed rats to a snake-feeder. Ultimately the decision is yours to make should you decide to keep this species.

Temperament varies among King Cobras. Our largest female was quite aggressive and wouldn't hesitate to engage us while one adult male was shy and would flee at any opportunity.. Hatchling are quite wiry and delicate. They will flail about when tailed and great care needs to be taken with them - again use shift boxes.

The pair that we successfully bred were Thai locale. The female was 12'+ at the time and the male was around 9'. I had raised both from hatchlings/neonates. The female was captive born and the male was an import “fresh from the bush”. Pre-breeding conditions were as follows: They were placed on Cypress mulch (but I would now suggest Sphagnum Moss instead) to help with the humidity. Both were maintained on food because of the ophiophagus factor involved (you don't want your Kings hungry during an introduction!!). A very mild almost non-existent cooling period was used in conjunction with heavy misting. The temp was normally kept at 75-80 degrees and during the misting period was dropped to 70-75 degrees for a period of six weeks. We misted on a bi-daily basis and fairly heavily. Again, this worked for us but may not be critical in inducing breeding. We merely tried to mimic monsoon conditions.

Breeding King Cobras can be an involved process and introducing pairs can be quite an ordeal to undertake. Very carefully introduce the pair!!!! Stay alert and ready to intervene should it become necessary. I have personally been very lucky and never had it happen, but I've heard nightmare stories of severe fights and one story of attempted ingestion of a mate. For this reason, I would suggest that they must be close in size to be introduced. We witnessed interesting foreplay - where the male head bobbed and pushed the female all over the cage with his head for hours apparently trying to convince her that he was the right mate. We only witnessed the pair copulating for about an hour (we are not sure if that was the only breeding as they were kept together for two periods of three days each time and the second introduction is when we know for sure they mated. They were not under constant supervision after the first few hours, so we are not sure of the exact length of copulation.). The female was gravid for 72 days, during which time we provided fortified rats every 7-10 days. For the most part she fed well the entire gestation period except for the last few weeks. Shredded newspaper was provided for nesting material which she would corral into her hide box(again I would now recommend sphagnum moss perhaps because newspaper is too dry and tends to stick to the eggs and dry them out, a mistake we learned from),. It was amazing to watch her undulate and loop the paper into the box. I don't think I have ever seen anything close to it in reptile behavior - very cool to watch. She laid 23 eggs, 19 of which were viable. There are reports of double clutches with Kings but I could not verify the accuracy of those reports - time will tell with so many people keeping them now. I don't equate snakes with much emotion but she did show some motherly gestures toward her eggs and gently nuzzle them with her nose. Normal incubation is 60-80 days and ours hatched out right on schedule in 69 days. Some breeders allow the female to incubate the eggs but to be on the safe side, I prefer to do it artificially. The litter size may reach up to 60 but probably averages around 20-30. Incubator temp was a constant 80-84 degrees for the 69 days and humidity, of course, was near 100%. Due to the fact that in our rural area we have power outages quite often, our incubators are always put on an APC backup battery just in case (these are found at most electronics stores). Babies were assist-hatched out at nearly 18” in length and they hooded immediately. They were dark black with light banding like little zebras and can make your eyes go dizzy when they crawl quickly around the cage, which is probably beneficial in eluding predators. Feeding baby Kings will grow remarkably fast. They are sorta amusing in behavior at first, without the necessary body strength they will hood up and fall over awkwardly or struggle while shaking under the difficult task. They are, however, extremely alert little guys and will watch you intently and follow your every move. They are nervous as well as skittish and flee quickly when disturbed. Sexes of the babies were fairly even in this clutch with 9 females and 10 males. The first shed occurred between 7 and 14 days and several fed while others refused. I have found this to be the norm. When purchasing baby Kings, the first question to ask is whether they have fed and on what. And how many times? You must look closely at the animal for signs of distress and not feeding as well as watching for signs of infections (bubble blowing, open mouth breathing, etc.). We have used the injectible antibiotic Baytril for respiratory infections with mixed success and I believe it is now given mostly orally. Despite the initial difficulties, I can't begin to tell you how exciting it is to hatch out baby Kings - simply phenomenal! It was definitely a milestone in our herping endeavors.

Tubed hatchling

Realize that a bite from Ophiophagus has a good chance of being fatal. Bites from a King Cobra are extremely neurotoxic and a large quantity of venom is usually injected. Kings have a multiple, jaw-walking, bite and a strong hold when they do bite (as previously mentioned). Bites are extremely dangerous, with predominately systemic neurologic symptoms that include drowsiness, eyelid drooping, respiratory paralysis with sever apnea (loss of breathing), convulsions, shock, nausea and vomiting, abdominal cramping and fever (need I go on?) basically attacking the central nervous system, stopping your breathing, lowering blood pressure, it may even stop the heart completely and the bite can be fatal within minutes if aggressive medical attention isn't undertaken immediately. THERE IS NO MARGIN FOR ERROR WITH THESE SNAKES! Even if you manage to survive the bite itself, you must then financially survive it. It would be a guess on my part due to the many factors involved but a bite surely would cost many thousands of dollars. Although they seem quite predictable after you get familiar with them, you should never let your guard down. We had taken some of our King Cobras to George Van Horne to take a venom sample and to help get a locale on them. We got to hear the story of his bite - a large King Cobra had bitten him on the arm and did indeed do the walking bite. After prying the animal off of his arm and putting it back in its cage, he washed his hands and picked up the phone to call for help - that's all he remembered. He had collapsed and his wife made the call. He was in a coma and had a lengthy recovery. It's a miracle he survived at all. I'm not sure of how much anti-venom was needed to treat him. A vial of anti-venom costs approximately between $600-1000 and the average bite would take at least 10-30 vials, quite possibly more depending on severity of the bite. It is available at the Miami-Dade anti-venom bank, which acquires it from the Thai Red Cross Society. Tiger Snake anti-venom has been used as well.

In conclusion, the King Cobra is a fascinating and rewarding animal to maintain. Despite its reputation, its requirements can be rather easily met, if you do your homework and put forth the extra effort with them. The methods and thoughts I have shared here are my personal experiences. I don't claim to be an expert in all aspects of them, so use your judgement and innovation in caring for your King Cobras. And be willing to share your information (both the good and the mistakes you've made) with others. Always be safe and acknowledge what you're dealing with. Have the utmost respect for these animals. Find an experienced keeper to show you all the tricks and tips - don't be afraid to ask questions. Have the proper cage setups and proper handling equipment before you get your animals. A well thought-out emergency plan with copies of the protocols ready to use is a must. I hope this has provided some useful information and will help you be successful with the King should you choose to keep them. Good luck and be safe!!!!!