King Cobras (pic heavy)

[Jazzz]

I was lucky enough to do a king cobra trip with Bali reptile rescue and Longqi on here. We did a 2 day trip and relocated 3 nests, 85 eggs, and 2 female kings in west bali.

The first king was an impressive 3.5m female who was a little flightier then usual apparently.





Her nest was in a pretty tricky spot in a clump of bamboo. Recovered 35 eggs from her.



We then went to a second nest, however, couldnt find the female so just recovered her nest.



It wasnt all reptiles though, we also got to feed these adorable rehab juvenile hornbills.



That night we went herping through some nice paddies getting a banded krait, retic, a couple of bronze backs, rat snake, banded wolf snake, assorted toads, one mystery litoria, bali chameleon and a tokay. (i apologise for the average photos).


Tokay


retic


retic


Banded krait

The next day we went back into king country and found the third females nest. A very small number of eggs at only 16. We found out why when we found her in a rock pile as she was only 2m long. She was still impressive at that size though putting on a nice defensive display.


Her nest


Her habitat











After bagging her (and taking some pics) he headed back to the depo where a few of the rehab, and resident, reptiles were waiting.



All up it was a fantastic trip and i would strongly recommend anyone heading to bali to check them out!

 

[elapid@]

Awesome pics, I definitely will drop in when I'm over there

 

[raycam01_au]

fellow Qlder

you are a braver gal than I hahahaha fotos are awesome, I would have run away screaming like alittle Boy was gunna say Girl, but after seeing your pics, I will go with boy hahahaha

awesome stuff those cobras are WOW

 

[andynic07]

Great photos and looks like a wonderful experience.

 

[Umbral]

Great pics! I'm a bit surprised how small those eggs are considering the size they grow to. They must start off pretty small.

 

[Trimeresurus]

Great pics! I'm a bit surprised how small those eggs are considering the size they grow to. They must start off pretty small.

Small and stripey!

 

[Umbral]

I was just comparing egg and adult size of my Tanami womas and those and although the cobras grow much bigger the eggs appear to be a lot smaller.

 

[Jazzz]

Yeah I was pretty surprised at the size of the eggs as well, I was expecting a little larger!

thanks!

 

[junglepython2]

Such awesome snakes, are the eggs incubated or destroyed? And are the kings released?

 

[Jazzz]

Eggs are incubated and kings are released to a safe area. They are nesting on private land and the locals are more then happy to kill them, which happens a lot.

 

[missilly]

Deadset the raddest thing I have ever seen! You got some courage girl!

 

[$NaKe PiMp]

wish there was more girls like you

 

[longqi]

Altogether we collected over 80eggs
We checked temperature and humidity before opening the nests
All eggs are now in incubators with original nest material at those temps

We are talking with king breeders and experts from everywhere
Seems baby kings have very high mortality rates
We have our own theory about this and looking for confirmation now
Hopefully we can get them released quickly away from humans but at similar altitude and habitat

Big one already released because in excellent condition
Smaller one is a skinny young mum
So bunged a feed into her and probably a couple more before release

 

[imported_Varanus]

Stunning snakes and a great read!

 

[Jazzz]

It was definitely an experience!

Longqi and his team were very professional and we never felt that we were in any real danger.

 

[moosenoose]

Saw your tail pulling on Facebook somewhere....and I suspected Longqi was behind it Awesome piccies! And fabulous experience!

 

[Renenet]

That's it, Longqi. I'm coming to visit you one day!

Nothing wrong with those photos, Jazzz. What an awesome experience.

 

[longqi]

She handled the second king like an expert
The bigger one was a lot trickier because it didnt follow the rules much

 

[Jazzz]

Haha probably, they are all on Facebook.

I had a big problem with my lens fogging in the insane humidity but they came out ok =]

thanks longqi, although I feel like that's a little more credit then I deserve. It was amazing how the team handled them, couldn't believe it!

 

[Porkbones]

Looks like an awesum experience !!! So lucky