AROD > Reptiles / Squamata / Boidae
Pythons
Boidae
| Etymology: | The family name comes from the American genus Boa, which in turn comes from the Latin boa, a large snake whose name is derived from bos because of a belief that it sucked milk from cows. The subfamily Pythonine comes from the genus Python, which was the name of a giant snake killed in Greek mythology by Apollo.1 | ||||||||||||
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| Notes: |
This family includes the New World boas (subfamily Boinae), the Old World pythons (subfamily Pythoninae), and the unusual rubber boas (subfamily Erycinae). It contains the largest and longest snakes in the world. All members of this family are non-venomous, killing their prey by constriction. This suffocates the prey item, and possibly also causes circulatory failure. Constriction is thought to be a primitive behaviour and is exhibited by a number of other snake families.2 In Australia, pythons can be distinguished from other land snakes by the higher count of midbody scale rows (more than about 30 versus fewer than about 25). Some scientists elevate Pythoninae to family level. |
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| Statistics: |
Reproductive modes:
Oviparous - 13 out of 13 Australian species Size range: Smallest Australian species: pygmy python (Antaresia perthensis) at 40 cm Longest Australian species: scrub python (Morelia kinghorni) at up to 850 cm |
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| Number of Australian genera: | 4 | ||||||||||||
| Number of Australian species: | 13 | ||||||||||||
| Genera: |
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- Storr, G. M.; Smith, L. A.; & Johnstone, R. E. (2002). Snakes of Western Australia. Western Australian Museum. 309 - search web for this book
- Greene, H. W. & Burghardt, G. M. (1978). Behavior and phylogeny: constriction in ancient and modern snakes. Science, 200(4337):74-77.