As Greg said, "Watch out for the feeding responce!"

HYDRODYNASTES GIGAS

I was introduced to these magnificent snakes in 1984 at the Nickerson Park Zoo. Max Nickerson gave me a behind the scenes tour at his facility. At this time he was also Head-Vertebrate Division at the Milwaukee Public Museum. Needless to say I trusted what he said. I saw the False Waters and asked a lot of questions about them. When I asked about their temperament he proceeded to open the cage and pull out the snake! I was hesitant at first but he insisted that it would not bite so I held the snake. This snake was between 8-9 ft. long! I fell in love with this animal. So much for them only reaching 6ft!
In 1989 I purchased a pair of these snakes from Louie Poras at Zoo Herp in Utah. The female was 3ft. and had less yellow than the 4ft. male. In 1991 the male was 7ft. and the female was 5ft. I treated them as tropical snakes when I put them together for breeding purposes. I only cooled them to low 70's and put them together with no interest. This was mid-winter. Since they did not breed I decided to sell them. I wanted to take pics of them but, as you know they do not sit still for long! So I cooled them to 60 degrees with hopes that this would slow them down long enough for me to take my photos. I got my pics and put them back together. They immediately began breeding! I discovered by accident that they needed to be cooled cooler than I thought. When the eggs were laid I put them in the incubator at 90 degrees figuring
once again that they should be treated as tropical animals. Wrong again! The neonates died full term in the eggs. I had them too hot. Shortly thereafter I moved and did not have the space available so I parted with them.
I purchased another pair of hatchling gigas a few years ago from Wes Pollack. They are het for hypo. The father was hypo and the mother was normal. I'm glad to have these again. They are certainly more popular now. They are very high strung compared to my previous ones.

Now for the facts?

False Water Cobras or Brazilian Smooth Snakes.

Most literature recognizes 2 subspecies (H. bicintus and H. gigas). Mertens in his book "Living Snakes of the World" mentions a 3rd (H.shultzi). He also mentions that studies are in the works that may show all three to be one or the other genus. This was written in 1987 and I have
not found any more mention of it. Some of the photos of H. bicintus look like H.gigas! John Coburn's "The Atlas Of Snakes Of The World", and Dr. Marcos Freiberg’s "Snakes of South America" is the same lame photo. There is a photo of a H. bicintus in Frieberg’s labeled H.gigas. I think the photo captions were reversed and Coburn used the same mis-labeled photo. Campbell & Lamar’s "The Venomous Reptiles of Latin America" has a photo of H.bicintus. It has a lot of red on it. This is a much redder snake than H.gigas. Louis Poras also confirmed this to me by phone conversation. H.bicintus is well known for being a very
difficult snake to maintain in captivity because they do not feed well. This is also mentioned in a paper entitled "Analysis of the Duvernoy's Gland and Oral Secretions of Hydrodynastes gigas (Dumeril, Bibron, and Dumeril) (Reptilia: Serpentes). This is an excellent paper addressing the venom of the False Waters. It is mentioned that most bites occur from the H.gigas related to a feeding response. They could not find info about H.bicintus bites because of poor feeding habits! Most of the bites from H. gigas produced little symptoms but some have produced considerable pain and swelling. A larger H. gigas can possibly do a lot of damage! The toxicity of these snakes is well within the range of many rattlesnakes!
This book also mentions that H. gigas is capable of reaching lengths of 3 meters!
From some of the websites that I have seen concerning False Waters I have seen and read mis-information. I guess it's true that you cannot believe everything you see or read on the net! Just because someone has a website does not mean that they have done the research.
REMEMBER, Schmidt and Mertens died from a rearfang snakebite!

If I offended anyone by this I apologize. This is only meant to assist those interested in the False Water Cobras. I used the following references from my library, which you may wish to check out yourself. Some are obviously questionable.

"The Atlas Of Snakes Of The World" John Coburn 1991

"Contributions in Herpetology" Edited by Peter D. Strimple and Jane L.
Strimple 1992

"Amphibians And Reptiles Of The Paraguayan Chaco Volume 1" David R. Norman
1994

"The Venomous Reptiles of Latin America" Jonathan A. Campbell and William W.
Lamar 1989

"Snakes Of The World" Scott Weidensaul 1991

"Living Snakes of the World" John M. Mertens 1987

"The Encyclopedia of Snakes" Chris Mattison 1995

"Snakes" Johan Marias 1997

"Vivarium Magazine" 4.3 Monique Halloy

“Reptile & Amphibian Hobbyist” February, 2000 Mary Edith Moore

If anyone has more info available I would like to know of it.
-----
Tim Cole
www.Designeratrox.com/
www.AustinReptileService.net
www.AustinReptileExpo.com/
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~<
Conservation through Education

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