>>Last night I was checking on a new arrival, about a 6' female forest cobra, when a very unexpected thing happened. I disturbed her out of her hide so she was pretty pissy (though admittedly that's not at all hard to accomplish) and she proceeded to do the typical stand up half her body length and gape at me. She took a lunge at me and I noticed something wet land on my hand. I also kind of "sprayed" across the top of the hide box, which means some of it went down rather than all of it spraying out (indicating there was not much power behind it). So my question is, have melanoleuca ever been documented to spit, or in this case drool and spray, venom? I of course didn't test this liquid to see if it was venom or saliva and none landed in my eyes so I can't really attest to that aspect, but upon casual observation is was a clearish liquid that could have very well been venom but could have been saliva as well. Anyway, just a neat occurence I thought I'd post about. If indeed it was venom, it just goes to show that one should always remain on his/her toes when working with any cobras as some rather unexpected spitters may arise.

>>-Chance

>>River Valley Snakes



Hi Chance,



There is no record of N. melanleuca ever spitting like a spitter. I suppose a lunge coupled with an exhalation might carry either saliva or even venom over a short distance. Over what sort of distance did it travel in this case? In what direction? staright ahead, or ahead and down?



Just curious, as it's an itneresting observation.



Cheers,



Wolfgang
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