Those afraid of snakes may want to read this story through their fingertips with their eyes mostly covered. It turns out that snake researchers in India saw a Burmese python eating a reticulated python whole in 2020.
This is apparently the first time scientists have seen the two species treat each other as prey. The Burmese and the reticulated python are two of the world’s largest serpents. The Burmese can easily grow to 15 feet in length or more, while the reticulated python can reach a blood-curdling length between 20 and 30 feet when mature.
How long does it take for a 15-foot Burmese to make a meal out of an even larger reticulated python? According to the scientific article published in the August 20 edition of Reptiles and Amphibians, it’s a leisurely two-hour repast.
Ashikur Rahman Stone, an ecologist at Bangladesh’s Dhaka University, said it was already unusual to find the two different pythons in the same region, let alone to see one eat the other. When the group who observed the feasting came upon the two snakes, the Burmese python had wrapped itself around the reticulated snake. The second snake did fight back, but a false move made it lose its grip and the Burmese gobbled it up like a noodle, starting tail-first.
The Burmese in this case was 10 feet long. Researchers say they were not able to measure the length of the reticulated python because it had already become the other snake’s lunch.
The unsavory meal was eaten on the Akiz Wildlife farm in the Chittagong Division of Bangladesh. This happens to be one of the few places where the living and hunting territory of Burmese and reticulated pythons overlaps. Both snakes usually make meals out of birds, lizards, and small mammals.
Reticulated pythons get their name from the pattern of interlocked diamond-shaped markings down the body length. Other animals with similar markings are referred to as “reticulated.”
The researchers are not sure what made the Burmese hungry for its larger relative, but they speculate that food competition in their overlapping territory may have motivated the deadly (for one of them) encounter.
