Housing/husbandry for False Water Cobra?

[Joel La Rocque]

I answered the questions and hit send prior to reading what I wrote. I hit the stop tab and lost everything so here is the short version.
Please remember that I am at the BOTTOM of the venom chain just barely above the snake. I gather the venom and send it off to different Labs to be processed into what ever they are manufacturing. At times we get the venom sent back with the sticker "unusable" placed on it. I usually know what the problem was but I call anyway. Here is the lines that I usually get.
The venom did not have the proper number of sought after proteins on a milligram per milligram basis. For example lets say the manufacturer was designing an anti venom for all North American species of pit vipers. Like Crofab They need the venom from four species of snakes. The Eastern and Western diamondbacks are two, the Mojave rattlesnake is number three and the Southern Cottonmouth is number four. Even though I send them the venom's requested they must have the proper proteins by mass weight for the venom's to work. The Mojave Rattlers venom must be Type-A venom possessing high fractions of the acidic sub-unit. This protein has a molecular weight (MW) of about 2.500 Dalton's as well as the basic Phospholipase (PLA-2) toxin found in almost all pit vipers to be acceptable. Both combined make a potent neurotoxin with a MW of 38.000 Dalton's. One of the larger components of the FWC secretions is a neurotoxin with a MW of 38.000Dalton's. I see this on paper and I know they are talking about a "Neurotoxin" This is usually found in Elapids, Rear fanged Colubrids and a few vipers when in a state of Flux, which I believe the Mojave rattlesnake to be in at this time. For the two types of toxins to bind they must have a binding agent ie. Disulphide bridge or bond. A disulphide bond is a strong covalent bond capable of linking polypeptide chains in proteins together via an oxidation of the sulfhydryl groups of two molecules of Cysteine. In short, after being told this over and over again, I merely have to see the numbers of the components and the types found in the venom to know it is a neurotoxin. Nothing genius about it, just repetition and remembering the base element weights. All snake venom's have a certain number of neurotoxins, amino acids, proteins, Phospholipases A2's within their construction. In fact the acidic toxins found in the Mojave rattlesnake alone would not cause any ill effects on a human body alone. But when added to the Tissue destructive proteins also found in the venom they make the most potent neurotoxin to be found in any North American snake alive today. I saw the numbers and knew it was a neurotoxin. The proteins are extremely small fractions and are weighed in the unit of measure called "Dalton's" 1 gram (about the weight of an M&M plane) is equal to 6.022.173.643 plus 23 Dalton's or a million million billion Dalton's give or take a few. You will get a different weight if you use different methods of separating the protein such as by "Gel Filtration" or by "Ultracentrifugation" to name but two methods.
The bottom line is that I simply have picked up information over the years that has little to do with my work with snakes. I send off small samples of venom to be assayed and if the numbers are within the tolerance levels, Great! The sad part is that I like to give the right information when asked and at times it will not be viewed as correct by others. You are the one who must take the different answers and research them both and then decide which one to subscribe to. There is no such thing as a Genius or Expert when it comes to snakes or Toxins. Both fields are in their infancy and new components are being discovered every day making yesterdays fact a misnomer and now useless. Learn for yourself and if it sounds a bit off to you, it probably is. Who you believe is irrelevant, it is what you believe that will either make or break you. I believe no one, I look for myself and then decide.
I hope this straightened out the mystery of the FWC venom case. I still am animate about never letting any snake chew on your finger. I have a good story about that happening a few years ago but I will save that for another time.

Thanks Joel

[Joel La Rocque]

Bicinctis or Gigas? This snake has caused a lot of discussion over the past few years. I received mine in 2005 when I was asked to fill an upcomming order. I ordered Hydrodynastes Gigas and was sent two females. It took almost three months of collecting before I had enough Duvernoy's secretion to send off for an assay. It came back and I sent it off to the Lab that ordered it. The components were within tolerance so all was fine. The next year I filled I think three orders and had no complaints. I had the opportunity to purchase another FWC from a fellow who was being shipped over seas and could not take it. It did not look exactly like the two I had so I started a little leg work to find out exactly what I had.
OK the FWC has five sub-species according to most scholars and only two sub species by others. The two are Bicinctis and Gigas. Bicinctis was founded by Herrmann in 1804 and Gigas was discovered in 1854 by Dumeril, Bibron and Dumeril. Schultzi and the other two were found some where in between. Now lets say there are only the Two. Bicinctis is found in the areas of Colombian Guyana, Amazon Venezuela, Amazon Brazil, Roraima Brazil, Para Brazil, Amapa Brazil, Guyana, Surinam and French Guyana. That is 9 large provinces covering an incredible amount of territory. Hydrodynastes Gigas is found in Amapa Brazil and French Guyana only. The rest is supposition by me only. Considering the large land mass covered by Bicinctis I believe that a large majority of snakes owned (Including those owned by me) are Bicinctis and the few odd colored species seen only on occasion are Gigas. There is absolutely no genetic material on file that I could find to distinguish the two. Perhaps in the future there will be a definitive answer but for me I am going to call mine Bicinctis as I will no longer be selling their venom, which I have always sold as Gigas. The main thing for me is that the proper components were there regardless if I got them from a snake or from a skunk so who cares?
What you call yours is up to you but think about the number of people gathering the large number of snakes ordered by the pet and venom trade and then think of how many snake would have to be living in the two areas where Gigas is found. Could there be that quantity of animals living in a small area? Joel

[Will0W783]

From what I've seen on Fauna and Kingsnake and other places I look for snakes, FWCs are almost always CBB, so I think it is possible that they are descended from Gigas that were imported generations ago.

[Will0W783]

Joel, do you happen to have any pictures of the Bicinctus you have? I'd be really curious to see how they compare to my FWC, as the only picture I found of Bicinctus online wasn't a very good quality.

[Will0W783]

I also need to get some better pictures of my FWC, Rogue. right now I only have one of him in a Rubbermaid container and it doesn't show his face or the really cool pearly peach on his sides.

[Joel La Rocque]

Hi friends:
Willow you have a valid point on the CBB and I would really love to any other information you might come across. I have a 35MM camera and I will get the pictures you want and send them to you, It will take a few days, Film is old fashioned and cumbersome but it is what I am use to so I guess I will stick with it.
I wish I had studied this subject a few years ago because it is fixed in my mind now and I hate to let things go with out knowing what is right. It never really mattered as long as it possessed the right components but now it is a real challenge.
Please keep me informed. Thanks Joel

[Will0W783]

No problem, thanks for your input Joel. I'm awfully curious- I did find some better pictures of Bicinctus, and I guess I could see how some would be confused, but do they hood like Gigas? All the hooding pictures I've found are of Gigas, at least claimed to be.

[Joel La Rocque]

Hello folks:
I sent a fax to the Institute of Butantan in Brazil asking them to identify the two. I would think that since this animal lives in their back yard they should have the correct answer? As soon as I get a reply, I will send it on. At the moment I am in excruciating pain and am going to take a pill and Lay down. As soon as I get it, I will send it.
Bye for now.
Joel

[jparker1167]

hey Mr. fry nice to see you here, is that really you bryan fry ?

[venomdoc]

Yes it is we
We are the Bryan
Resistance is futile
You will be assimilated
;p

[Will0W783]

ROTFL! Well this is great having several venomous experts on Ssnakess! I hope to learn a lot from both of you, but I doubt I will ever have anything more venomous than my FWC, I just don't trust myself with deadly snakes. lol. Bryan, what's your take on FWC venom?

[venomdoc]

Its been equated as being on par with rattlesnake venom. Which thus makes it relatively quite weak. Typical rattlesnake venom takes about ~ 100 milligrams to kill a human. There is no way even a huge Hydrodynastes would be able to produce let alone deliver that much. The venom composition is also poorly known but based upon bite observations and taxonomical closeness to Heterodon (for which there is a bit more information) I'd say the venom is most likely to be rich in CRiSP and kallikrein toxins. The latter certainly would account for the localised pain and swelling.

I would not put Hydrodynastes gigas in the 'dangerous' category, unlike snakes such as Dispholidus typus.

Cheers
The Bryan Collective

[Will0W783]

Thanks Bryan. I don't consider him like a rattlesnake, but I do not wish to be bitten by him. I do handle him, but use gloves to get him out. He's quite calm and docile, save for a bit of cage defensiveness, hence the gloves to get him out. Hopefully he will stay that way, as I don't wish to be bitten by him when he's full grown, but if I were to get bitten, I wouldn't need to go to a hospital right?

[venomdoc]

The odds of a life-threatening or even medically significant bite are quite low. Not to say they arent quite capabe of slicing you up nicely though! Watch out for that feeding response!

[Will0W783]

Yeah. I am quite careful with him. He's only about 2.5 feet long right now, but an alert little fellow. The only other snake I have that is so alert and watchful of me is my tiger rat (Spilotes) - he stares me down whenever I enter the room..lol