''Python brongersmai'' is a species of non venomous snake in the family Pythonidae. The species is native to Southeast Asia.

Common names

Common name In biology, a common name of a taxon or organism (also known as a vernacular name, English name, colloquial name, country name, popular name, or farmer's name) is a name that is based on the normal language of everyday life; and is often contrast ...

s for ''P. brongersmai'' include blood python, Brongersma's short-tailed python, Malaysian blood python, red blood python, red short-tailed python, and Sumatran blood python.

Etymology

The

specific name Specific name may refer to: * in Database management systems, a system-assigned name that is unique within a particular database In taxonomy, either of these two meanings, each with its own set of rules: * Specific name (botany), the two-part (bino ...

, ''brongersmai'', is in honor of Dutch herpetologist Leo Brongersma.

Geographic range

''P. brongersmai'' is found in peninsular (Western) Malaysia,

Sumatra Sumatra is one of the Sunda Islands of western Indonesia. It is the largest island that is fully within Indonesian territory, as well as the sixth-largest island in the world at 473,481 km2 (182,812 mi.2), not including adjacent i ...

east of the central dividing range of mountains, Bangka Island and other islands in the Strait of Malacca, including the Lingga Islands, Riau islands, and Pinang, Thailand, and Vietnam.

Habitat

The preferred natural habitat of ''P. brongersmai'' is marshes and tropical

swamp A swamp is a forested wetland.Keddy, P.A. 2010. Wetland Ecology: Principles and Conservation (2nd edition). Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK. 497 p. Swamps are considered to be transition zones because both land and water play a role in ...

s in forest, at altitudes from sea level to .

Behaviour

''Python brongersmai'' is a primarily

crepuscular In zoology, a crepuscular animal is one that is active primarily during the twilight period, being matutinal, vespertine, or both. This is distinguished from diurnal and nocturnal behavior, where an animal is active during the hours of daylig ...

species (usually active around dawn and dusk).

Size

Hatchlings of ''P. brongersmai'' range from in total length (including tail). Adult males typically range from in total length, and females between although a few have been recorded at . These snakes generally look overweight due to their robust structure.

Lifespan

''P. brongersmai'' can live up to about 20 years in captivity.

Coloration

The color pattern of ''P. brongersmai'' consists of rich, bright red to orange to a duller rusty red ground color, although populations with yellow and brown are known. This is overlaid with yellow and tan blotches and stripes that run the length of the body, as well as tan and black spots that extend up the flanks. The belly is white, often with small black markings. The head is usually a shade of grey; individual snakes can change how light and dark the head is. A white postocular stripe runs down and back from the posterior edge of the eye.

Reproduction

''Python brongersmai'' is

oviparous Oviparous animals are animals that lay their eggs, with little or no other embryonic development within the mother. This is the reproductive method of most fish, amphibians, most reptiles, and all pterosaurs, dinosaurs (including birds), and ...

, with up to 30 eggs being laid at a time. The female coils around her eggs and shivers her body, producing heat to incubate the eggs properly.

Commercial trade

Once widely considered to be generally unpredictable and aggressive, ''P. brongersmai'' is gradually becoming more common among herpetoculturists. Formerly, many of the specimens in captivity were wild-caught adults from Malaysia. These are known to be more aggressive than those from Indonesia (

), from which most of the wild-caught, wild-bred, and captive-bred stock are now descended. Captive-raised juveniles generally become mild-tempered, somewhat-predictable adults. This, combined with several new brightly colored captive bloodlines, is helping to boost the popularity of these much-maligned snakes among reptile hobbyists. ''Python brongersmai'' is part of a commercial harvest for leather. There is evidence to suggest that there are clear indications of misdeclared, underreported and illegal trade involving tens of thousands of blood pythons, and there are questions whether this trade is sustainable

Taxonomy

This species was first described by Olive Griffith Stull in 1938 as ''Python curtus brongersmai'', a

subspecies In biological classification, subspecies is a rank below species, used for populations that live in different areas and vary in size, shape, or other physical characteristics (morphology), but that can successfully interbreed. Not all species ...

of ''

Python curtus The Sumatran short-tailed python (''Python curtus'') is a species of the family Pythonidae, a nonvenomous snake native to Sumatra. Taxonomy ''Python curtus'' was the scientific name proposed by Hermann Schlegel in 1872 for a python with a shor ...

''. Stull OG (1938). "Three New Subspecies of the Family Boidae".
''Occasional Papers of the Boston Society of Natural History'' 8: 297-300.
(''Python curtus brongersmai'', new subspecies, pp. 297-298). This taxon has since been elevated and recognised as a full species, ''Python brongersmai'', by Pauwels et al. (2000).