Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hello,
I volunteer at the local zoo in my city and we recently rescued an albino green burm from a 19 year old college student. The student had not fed the snake for about 4 months and kept him in a ten gallon fish tank with very little humidity and heat . He said the snake was about a year and a half. We measured the poor guy and he is about 2 and a half feet. This is the first burm I have dealt with. I mostly manage venomous snakes and collubrids. We have one green tree python but he was imported from another zoo and has a great history. From what I know about burms (and please feel free to correct me) most of there size/length comes within the first year of birth. I’m not a detective but it seems like his keeper did not feed him regularly even before the four month fast. After a month of playing with temperature and humidity and different sized (thawed) rodents he finally ate. My question is will he be 2 and a half feet for good? After reaching sexual maturity (assuming he has already reached it or approaching) will he get any larger? The zoo would like to keep him however we never have accepted a captured bred pet like this before. We would like input on what we can expect from this animal. Thank You

That person should be in jail.I have a male burm and he is about
7 month old and he is 5 feet males are somewhat smaller then females they can get 8feet plus by 1 year .

>My question is will he be 2 and a half feet for good?

No. He will grow.

>After reaching sexual maturity (assuming he has already reached it or approaching) will he get any larger?

I do not think he is sexually mature yet. And he will get larger even after sexual maturity.

>The zoo would like to keep him however we never have accepted a captured bred pet like this before. We would like input on what we can expect from this animal.

Keep it by all means. Albino greens are beautiful. Handle him for a few minutes daily, and he could become a sweetheart and a star of the zoo shows.

I do not think he will get as big as he might have if properly fed this past year, but I think there is a high probability that he will reach 8 feet within the next 4 years. Snakes are pretty good at bouncing back from bad conditions.

Paul Hollander

np

dont be surprised if the burm grows like a weed in this next year if you feed it appropriate sized meals. my friend got a retic that was not feed properly and once he started feeding it apropriate meals it was putting on a foot a month. it balloned from 7 feet to 12 feet in no time. but that could just be retics.