NATURAL HISTORY
Boiga melantoa is one of the largest, if not THE largest Boiga if you take into consideration overall size and mass. This snake lives in Southern Myanmar which actually runs parallel and adjacent to Southern Thailand. It also occurs in Malaysia, Singapore and Sumatra in Indonesia. This was recognized as a subspecies of dendrophila but was given full species status in 2020 and is now simply Boiga melanota. These are found almost always off the ground in trees and will usually be around fresh, salt and brackish water. They are nocturnal so they are active at night and during the day they will sleep in trees. If they feel threatened they will readily launch themselves into the water where they will swim off as they seem very comfortable. These snakes have a very impressive threat display in which they will coil back with an open mouth. They usually will bite as the next step but they are also keen to turn and remove themselves from any situation that they perceive as threatening. As with all Boiga, they are rear-fanged which means they have the enlarged upper teeth in the rear of the mouth, and also a venom gland which gets toxins into the saliva but generally requires a chewing motion to actually deliver any venom. While I have been bit by many different Boiga, this is one that actually did result in some localized pain. I once received a bite across the top of my fingers that resulted in the rear fang penetrating skin across the top of a knuckle and that particular joint was achy and arthritic for a little over one week. I think this was due to the size of the full-grown adult that bit me but I always recommend to just avoid be bitten. These do seem to be more calm during that day as compared to at night. Their diet in the wild consists of birds, eggs, rodents, amphibians, lizards and other snakes including each other. The appearance of melanota is quite variable and also is quite different from other dendrophila. Melanota are commonly seen with incomplete bands spaced further apart but can be found with little to no yellow banding. They also tend to be longer and bulkier than other dendrophila.
CAPTIVE CARE/DIET/ACCLIMATION
These snakes are nocturnal so I prefer to offer prey items in the evening time when they are most active. Melanota are a bit less finicky than dendrophila in that they will usually take rodents. I prefer to offer live rat pups for first meals. If this is not successful, I will then try f/t chicks or quail left in the cage overnight. I usually will have success with all animals but if any refuse I will try scenting with lizards, frogs or fish, or simply offer lizards or frogs but usually f/t. I do not find this species difficult to get feeding. I recommend arboreal caging, hides both on and off the ground and little or no lighting. As with any other wild-caught animals, I also recommend to avoid handling as this is usually just causing unnecessary stress. After 1-2 successful and voluntary feedings, I will run a treatment course of flagyl and panacur just as a precautionary measure to address anything that may be happening internally that I am not aware of. Mite treatment is probably something I do not need to even mention because you should be treating every single animal for mites upon arrival. I usually find myself feeding once per week but meals spaced a little closer together is also ok. A warm spot of about 86-87f is optimal with a much lower ambient to allow the animal to select its preferred temperature.
BREEDING
Breeding these and just about most Boiga is pretty simple IF you have healthy, thriving adults. As with all of my pairings, I rely on palpating for follicles before I do introductions to reduce the chance that one may eat the other. I also will do the introduction a day or two after meals because most snakes will start to learn your feeding schedule after a while so pairing around the day you would normally feed is probably not a good idea. These snakes will lay 4-12 eggs on average and we incubate at lower temps around 81-82f and eggs take roughly 90 days to hatch but it can vary depending on the temps you choose in incubate with. Boiga eggs are very thick so I have made it a practice to wait for one baby to pip first and then I will manually pip all of the eggs at that point. We do not pull babies from the eggs like you see in youtube videos, these will sit in the eggs to absorb their yolk sacs and when they are ready they will leave the eggs on their own. I recommend using an incubator that provides stable temps and also opt for lower temps as kinks can be an issue with this species.
ESTABLISHING BABIES
Just like the adults, babies are more inclined to self start on day old pinks. All of the usual scenting techiniques are recommended for any that are problematic and also assist feeding as shown in my cyanea video would be a last resort. I feed the babies weekly and if they look like they can take more food to fill out better, I may shorten the feeding intervals. Babies are generally placid but may get a little spunky if you are messing with them at night when they are more active.
FINAL THOUGHTS
I started working with melanota around 20 years ago and I can remember bringing cb babies to expos…..and bringing them home after the expos because they just weren’t popular back in those days. They also had the bad reputation associated with problematic and compromised field collected imports from Indonesia so it was an uphill battle. As markets and interests changed and Boiga became of interest to some hobbyists, there was a lot of attention placed on captive bred babies. As things were evolving for me and I was spreading my wings, I found it easier to have animals set up for breeding in Malaysia so I could focus on other species to breed in the USA. At the moment, that is still the case and we actually have eggs incubating right now in our facility in Malaysia so we hope the have those arrive stateside sometimes in June after we arrive stateside ourselves. We have now added some breeding stock back to the USA side of our operations.