At the time of writing this article I
have three Mulga Snakes which
have been in my collection for
around five years. All three were
obtained from reputable keepers
as St George-locality (in South
West Queensland) animals.
Specimens from this region are a
beautiful red in colour; they are
popular with keepers and amongst
the easiest to obtain in captivity. I
have found Mulga Snakes to be a
relatively straightforward species
to maintain. The adults are housed
under simple and basic conditions,
using traditional, standard
melamine enclosures measuring
120cm wide by 60cm deep and
45cm high. Infrared heat globes
are positioned at one end of the
enclosures to create a thermal
gradient, and this is controlled by
dimming thermostats to maintain a
hot spot of approximately 34 o C.
The cooler ends sit a bit above
ambient room temperature at
around 25 o C. Adults are notorious
for being almost like garbage
disposal units in captivity; hungrily
devouring any food items offered
to them, including rats, mice,
chickens and rabbits. Mine are fed
medium-sized rats, with the
occasional week-old or two-week-
old chicken. Throughout the
warmer months they are fed every
two to three weeks. During the
cooling period, I continue to feed
the female at a reduced rate, while
the males are not fed at all. As far
as handling is concerned, my
experience is that although Mulga
Snakes have a very strong and
aggressive feeding response while
in the cage, once out they are
easily tailed and moved around for
general husbandry purposes.
I kept this species for a couple of
years before attempting to breed
them, with the first successful
breeding occurring during the
2016 season. Male #1 was
obtained with the female as a pair,
and male #2 was procured
separately, from another source.
The approximate weights of each
animal coming into the breeding
season were as follows:
species I have bred in the past.
The daytime basking temperature
was kept consistent, but the
number of hours this was provided
for was reduced as winter
approached. During the summer
months, the adults received 16
hours of heating per day. Regular
feeding was discontinued in early
April, and then from late April the
heating period was slowly wound
down (a couple of hours at a time,
every few weeks) so that in June it
had decreased to seven hours per
day. The night time temperature
dropped as low as approximately
15 o C in the coolest part of the
year.
Mating trials commenced at the
beginning of July, with the males
introduced into the female’s
enclosure. I cycled each male
alternatively, with the female
receiving a break of a week in
between. Mating activity was
generally observed within the first
Female: 1.3kg
day or two; if not, I would remove
Male #1: 1.3kg
the male. Male #2 seemed to be
Male #2: 970g
more interested than male #1, so
he was used more frequently.
For a cooling regime, I treated this Later on, male #1 was also
species very similarly to python
witnessed biting the female and