Reticulated python

• 1. Introduction

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  The reticulated python is the longest snake in the world, and a cash prize for beating its records has gone unclaimed for many years. The New York Zoological Society, later renamed the Wildlife Conservation Society, first offered $1,000 for a live, healthy snake of 30 ft or longer. The reward rose to $5,000, then to $15,000 in 1978, then to $50,000 in 1980. No one has ever tried to claim it.

  Behind that unclaimed prize sits a snake that already ranks third in weight, after the green anaconda and the Burmese python. It carries no venom. It kills by squeezing, and it lives across South and Southeast Asia.

  This documentary asks how big the reticulated python really grows, and why that question is so hard to settle. It asks why the animal's scientific name has changed hands so often. It asks what happens where people share forests with the largest snakes on the continent. And it asks how a forest ambusher ended up as a pet.

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• 2. Measuring Giants

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  In November 1956, a measurement taken at the Highland Park Zoo in Pittsburgh gave a python named Colossus a peak reported length of 8.7 m. For years that made it the most accurately measured giant snake on record. The zoo is now the Pittsburgh Zoo and Aquarium. Colossus died on the 14th of April 1964, and its body went to the Carnegie Museum of Natural History. The skeleton measured 20 ft 10 in. The fresh hide measured 23 ft 11 in, but hides stretch during skinning, often by 20-40% or more.

  The earlier figures had been pieced together from partial measurements, with estimates added to cover the kinks, because fully straightening a huge living python is close to impossible. A 2012 journal article concluded that Colossus was neither the longest nor the heaviest snake ever kept in captivity. The animal was too large for the usual formaldehyde and alcohol storage, so it was prepared as a disarticulated skeleton. Its hide went to a laboratory for tanning and was lost or destroyed. Today the museum holds only the skull and selected vertebrae and ribs. Even the sex of Colossus is muddled in the literature, which matters because females tend to be larger.

  In southern Sumatra, researchers studied more than a thousand wild reticulated pythons and estimated lengths from 1.5 to 6.5 m. Weights ran from 1 to 75 kg. Lengths beyond 6 m are rare, yet the Guinness Book of World Records calls this the only living snake that regularly passes that mark. One of the largest scientifically measured wild specimens came from Balikpapan in East Kalimantan, Indonesia. Under anesthesia it measured 6.95 m and weighed 59 kg, after almost three months without a meal.

  Captive records tell a similar story. A python named Medusa, in Kansas City, Missouri, was reported in 2011 at 7.67 m and 158.8 kg. Guinness considers it the longest verified living snake ever kept in captivity. In 2012, an albino python named Twinkie, in Fountain Valley, California, was recognized as the largest albino snake in captivity. It measured 7 m and weighed about 168 kg.

  Zoo claims can be wildly off. One snake in Indonesia was advertised at 14.85 m and later proved to be roughly 6.5-7 m. Strength, temperament and loose skin all make a live python hard to measure. So scientists accept lengths only from snakes that are dead or anesthetized and then preserved in a museum or kept for research. Weights mislead too, because captive pythons are often obese.

  Older claims are more dramatic and less trustworthy. An 1859 report from Bayan Lepas on Penang Island, Malaysia, described a snake of 853.4 cm found eating a pig on the road to Teluk Kumbar. A snake kept at the Mesker Zoo in Evansville, Indiana, between 1931 and 1948 was listed at 1023.62 cm and 303.907 kg, though that weight is believed to be an error. No scientist measured these animals and no museum received them, so they remain unproven. In 1912 on Sulawesi, the explorer Henry C Raven described a snake of 998.2 cm shot near a mining camp. One photograph was taken, and the body was not preserved.

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• 3. A Tangled Name

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  In 1801, Johann Gottlob Theaenus Schneider examined two specimens held by the Göttingen Museum that differed slightly in colour and pattern. He described them as two separate species, Boa reticulata and Boa rhombeata. The species name reticulatus is Latin for net-like, a nod to the intricate markings. The genus name Python came later, proposed by François Marie Daudin in 1803. Schneider's original description gave no type locality, so in 1972 Brongersma restricted it to Java.

  In 1993, Arnold G. Kluge ran a cladistics analysis on physical characters and found the reticulated python's lineage to be a sister of the genus Python. That meant no new genus name was needed. Genetics soon complicated the picture. A 2004 study of cytochrome b DNA, led by Robin Lawson and colleagues, placed the snake as a sister to the Australo-Papuan pythons instead of to Python molurus and its relatives.

  That same year, Raymond Hoser created the genus Broghammerus for the species. He named it after the German snake breeder Stefan Broghammer. Hoser pointed to dorsal patterns unlike those of Python, a dark line running along the middle of the back to the head, and a red or orange iris rather than a brown one. In 2008, Lesley H. Rawlings and colleagues reanalysed Kluge's data alongside genetic material. They also found an offshoot of the Australo-Papuan lineage, and they adopted and redefined the name Broghammerus.

  Most taxonomists still ignore Hoser's names, because his description lacked scientific rigour and did not appear in a reputable journal. In 2014, R. Graham Reynolds and colleagues proposed Malayopython instead. Later authors and the Reptile Database have recognized it. Hoser argues that Broghammerus was validly published and that Malayopython is a junior synonym. Reliable sources nonetheless keep Malayopython and treat Broghammerus as an invalid nomen nudum. Reynolds and his colleagues placed the Timor python beside the reticulated python in the new genus.

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• 4. Range and Habitat

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  Early in the 20th century, the reticulated python was said to be common even in busy parts of Bangkok, where it sometimes ate domestic animals. The city is just one corner of a vast range.

  The snake's territory begins with the Nicobar Islands and India and runs through Bangladesh, Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, Malaysia and Singapore. It then continues east through Indonesia, across Sumatra, Borneo, Sulawesi, Java, Flores, Timor and the Maluku and Tanimbar islands, among others. In the Philippines it turns up on islands such as Luzon, Mindanao and Palawan.

  The python favours rainforests, woodlands and nearby grasslands. It is also tied to water and is found near rivers, streams and lakes. It swims superbly and has been reported far out at sea. That talent explains how it has colonized many small islands within its range.

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• 5. Island Dwarfs

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  On Tanahjampea, a small island in the Selayar Archipelago south of Sulawesi, reticulated pythons grow to about half the usual length. In 2002, Auliya and colleagues described them as the subspecies M. r. jampeanus and said they rarely reach much more than 2 m. Three subspecies have been proposed in all, though the Integrated Taxonomic Information System does not recognize them. The nominate form, M. r. reticulatus, is the Asian reticulated python that Schneider described in 1801.

  The third subspecies, M. r. saputrai, lives on Selayar Island and in adjacent parts of Sulawesi. Genetic testing suggests it is a sister lineage to every other reticulated python population tested. According to Auliya and colleagues, it does not exceed 4 m. Six further proposed names, all informal, have not found general acceptance.

  Geography is a good guide to which form is which, because each has its own distinct range. Size and colour still vary a great deal among them. North of Sulawesi, the Sangihe Islands hold a population that appears to be another dwarf form, still awaiting formal description.

  Breeders have turned dwarfism into a product. Captive animals are called dwarf or super dwarf if at least 50 percent of their lineage comes from seven select islands in the Selayer chain near Sulawesi. Adult super dwarfs typically measure between 1.82 and 2.4 m.

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• 6. Pattern and Ambush

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  A series of irregular diamond shapes runs down the back of the reticulated python, flanked by smaller markings with light centres. Its smooth dorsal scales sit in 69-79 rows at midbody. Under zoo lights the pattern can look garish. In a shadowy jungle among fallen leaves and debris, it lets the snake all but vanish. Biologists call this disruptive colouration, and it both shields the python from predators and helps it catch prey. Across such a wide range, colour and markings vary commonly.

  The python is an ambush predator. It usually waits until prey wanders into striking distance, then seizes it in its coils and kills it by constriction. Its natural diet is made up of mammals, with the occasional bird. Snakes up to 3-4 m long eat mainly rats and other rodents, mouse-eared bats and treeshrews. Larger individuals switch to small Indian civets, binturongs, primates, wild boar and deer weighing more than 60 kg. The python seems able to swallow prey up to a quarter of its own length and up to its own weight. Near human settlements it occasionally snatches stray chickens, cats and dogs.

  One of the largest documented meals was a half-starved sun bear of 23 kg, eaten by an individual of 6.95 m in East Kalimantan. The digestion took about 10 weeks. That region is rich in prey, including the Bornean bearded pig, Muntiacus and Tragulus species, the southern pig-tailed macaque, civets, the Sunda pangolin and Old World porcupines.

  Female pythons lay eggs, between 15 and 80 per clutch. At the best incubation temperature the eggs take an average of 88 days to hatch. Even at hatching, each young python measures at least 2 ft.

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• 7. When Prey Is Human

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  In 1638, Antonio van Diemen, Governor-General of the Dutch East India Company, visited the Banda Islands. A report of the visit describes an enslaved woman tending a garden on the volcanic island of Gunung Api. A snake of 24 houtvoeten, around 7.3 m, strangled her and swallowed her whole. Slowed by the meal, the snake was shot by Dutch soldiers and brought to the Governor-General with its victim still inside. Several early travel journals describe similar episodes, though they are less reliable than this first-hand document.

  The reticulated python is among the few snakes that prey on humans. It is the only species for which video and photographic proof of consuming people exists. Its jaws can open wide enough to take a full-grown person. The width of an adult's shoulders can still defeat even a large snake. Attacks on people by captive pythons are not common. In the wild, particularly on Sulawesi, the story differs. At least eight reported cases of a human being eaten exist.

  On Salibabu island in North Sulawesi, early in the 20th century, a 14-year-old boy was killed and reportedly eaten by a python of 5.17 m. Another woman was reputedly eaten by a large reticulated python, but few details are known. In the early 1910s or in 1927, a jeweller who sheltered from a rainstorm in or under a tree was apparently eaten by a 6 m python, swallowed feet-first. Among a small group of Aeta people in the Philippines, six deaths from pythons were said to have been documented over 40 years, plus one person who died later of an infected bite. One foraging python is also reported to have entered a forest hut and taken a child.

  In September 1995, a 29-year-old rubber tapper in the Malaysian state of Johor was reported killed by a large python. His brother found the snake coiled around the lifeless body, with the victim's head gripped in its jaws. Police shot the python four times. It was reported as 23 ft long and more than 300 lb. In October 2003, a woman collecting paddy crops with her husband at Sajek Valley in Rangamati Hill District, Bangladesh, was reported eaten. Helpers retrieved her body from the python's belly.

  Captive snakes have killed too. In October 2008, a woman in Virginia Beach appeared to have died of asphyxiation caused by her 13 ft pet. The snake was later found agitated in her bedroom. In January 2009, a 3-year-old boy turned blue in the coils of a 5.5 m pet. His mother, who was petsitting for a friend, rescued him by slashing the python with a knife, and the snake was later euthanized.

  In December 2013, a 59-year-old security guard was strangled at about 3 am near the Bali Hyatt hotel in Sanur, Bali. A 4.5 m python had been seen several times near the hotel, and the guard had offered to help capture it as it crossed a road. In 2015, the United States added the species to its Injurious Wildlife List, prohibiting import and interstate transport. A court decision led to rescinding the interstate ban in 2017.

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• 8. Cases Since 2017

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  In March 2017, the body of Akbar Salubiro, a 25-year-old farmer in Central Mamuju Regency, West Sulawesi, was found inside a 7 m reticulated python. He had gone missing from his palm tree plantation, and searchers found the snake the next day with a large bulge in its stomach. They killed it and found the whole body inside. This was the first fully confirmed case of a person eaten by a python, and witnesses documented the retrieval with pictures and videos.

  In June 2018, a 54-year-old woman went missing at night while working in her garden on Muna Island, Southeast Sulawesi. A search party formed after her belongings turned up abandoned there. A 7 m python with a large bulge lay near the garden. The snake was carried into town and cut open, and her body was intact inside.

  In June 2020, a 16-year-old boy separated from four friends in the woods near a waterfall at Mount Kahar in Rumbia sub-district, Bombana Regency, Southeast Sulawesi. When he screamed, his friends found him encoiled by a 7 m python. Villagers killed it with a parang machete, but he had already suffocated.

  On the 23rd of October 2022, a 52-year-old woman went to tap rubber sap in Terjun Gajah village, Betara Subdistrict, West Tanjung Jabung Regency, Jambi, and did not come home. After a day and a night, a search party found a 6 m python with a bulge in a jungle near the plantation. Villagers killed and dissected it, and found her intact body. They feared more large pythons were nearby, because farmers had earlier reported two goats missing.

  The year 2024 brought a run of cases. In June, a woman from Kalempang village in South Sulawesi province went missing, and her body was found inside a python. Three weeks later, in July, another woman was found in a python's stomach in South Sulawesi. In August, an elderly woman was found dead after a 4 m python killed her and tried to swallow her. It could not get past her shoulders and regurgitated the body. Two weeks later, in Jambi province, a 5 m python killed another woman and swallowed half of her body before villagers found and killed it. In November, a 30-year-old man was killed and swallowed whole by a 7 m python. It was the first recorded case of an adult male being eaten since 2017.

  In July 2025, a man was killed and swallowed whole by an 8 m reticulated python in Majapahit Village, Batauga, in southeastern Sulawesi.

  Skins, traditional medicine and the pet trade make the reticulated python one of the most economically important reptiles in the world. In several countries within its range, people hunt it for all three. Because the snake is so widely distributed, the IUCN lists it as least concern.

  Its popularity as a pet rests largely on captive breeding and on selectively bred mutations such as the albino and tiger strains. Breeders have also recorded sunfire, motley, Aztec, ocelot, rainbow and goldenchild mutations. Some strains carry a hidden cost. The black eyed leucistic mutation is seldom bred, because animals develop fatal gastrointestinal problems on reaching adulthood. The jaguar mutation is controversial for a different reason. Certain specimens develop neurological problems and osseous inner ears, like the Spider mutation in ball pythons. It remains unclear why some jaguar pythons show these problems and others do not.

  Keepers say an adult from a mainland population can make a good captive, but they advise previous experience with large constrictors, for the safety of both animal and keeper. Its beauty and interactive nature draw attention, though some feel the snake is unpredictable. It may bite, and possibly constrict, if it feels threatened or mistakes a hand for food. The bite carries no venom, but a large python can inflict serious injuries, sometimes needing stitches.

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