A family of snakes that occur from Indonesia out into the Southern Pacific Islands. Often referred to under many names; Blunt Nosed Ground Boa, Solomon Island Ground Boa, to quote two. There are one or two other Boa types occurring in this area, the Viper Boa ( C. aspera ) and Bibrons Boa ( C. bibroni ) spring to mind. Also this group ( C. carinata ) can be fairly variable in both colour/pattering and also general form. Some authors refer to the subspecies paulsoni. These small boas appear to be big producers of very small babies that have a reputation of being really hard to feed. In fact feeding is usually an area of discussion generally! In years past, most of them that came to this country were probably from the area of the Solomon Islands. (These snakes are typically short-tailed). The Solomon Islands get around 20 feet of rain a year and I would guess that their feeding spells are fast and furious for short, intermittent periods.

Their colouration and patterning is highly variable and for some individual specimens their colour change ability is quite rapid and dramatic. (For one of my females, pale brown to pink tells me she is content and will feed, dark brown to black is time to leave her alone - incidentally black is the colour she goes if we have any mites around!) I've seen specimens of dark brown with cream markings, some are red down their flanks, some pink and the ones more recently seen around are varying shades of grey. As far as I'm aware, few, if any, snakes have come in from the Solomon Islands for 2 or 3 years; there are still adults and offspring around and occasionally available from back then. More recently, I've seen longer-tailed specimens available that have come from Indonesia, whether these are a subspecies or just shows us that they are a highly adaptable species is always open to discussion.

I'm not quite sure where the name of Ground Boa came from as mine spend a good three quarters of their time up in the branches, sat on show. They don't appear to be particularly active snakes, rarely just roaming around, usually they only move straight from one spot to another almost as if they have previously made decisions about where they prefer to sit. One of my females will almost only feed when she's perched in one spot, refusing food if she is resting in any other part of the vivarium. Space wise something around 2-3 feet by 1 foot by 1 foot is probably sufficient for a single female. The males are usually very small by comparison to the females and seem to be a boa that can be accurately sexed by spur size alone.

In a number of ways this species, particularly the short-tailed forms, remind me of Royal pythons as captive subjects, the longer tailed forms are perhaps a little like the Cooks boa family- these thoughts are not based on any scientific evidence, just on what they're like to keep and how they behave. I give mine a hot-spot in the mid 80s F. with a background of around 65-75 F. depending on time of day. Perhaps not the most exciting of species to keep, though fairly interesting with very little really known about their mating and courtship behaviour. A quick word of caution, I had a large, older female constrict and kill a young male.

 

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