Reticulated Python

Taken: March 24th, 2008.

Python reticulatus is a species of python found in Southeast Asia. This is the longest snake in the Old World and competes for the title of the world's longest snake with the South American green anaconda, Eunectes murinus. The specific name, reticulatus, is a Latin word that means net-like, or reticulated, and is a reference to the markings on the body.[3] No subspecies are currently recognized.[2]

[edit] Danger to humans
Attacks on humans are rare, but this species has been responsible for several human fatalities, in both the wild and captivity. They are among the few snakes that have been fairly reliably reported to eat people, although only 1–3 cases of the snake actually eating rather than just killing a human seem to have been verified:

Two incidents, apparently in early 20th century Indonesia: On Salibabu, a 14-year-old boy was killed and supposedly eaten by a specimen 5.17 m (c.17 ft) in length. Another incident involved an adult woman reputedly eaten by a "large reticulated python", but few details are known.[13]
Franz Werner reports [14] a case from Burma (or Myanmar) either occurring in the early 1910s or in 1927. A jeweller named Maung Chit Chine, who went hunting with his friends, was apparently eaten by a 6 m (20 ft) specimen after he sought shelter from a rainstorm on or under a tree. Supposedly, he was swallowed feet first, contrary to normal snake behavior but the easiest way for a snake to actually swallow a human.[15]
In 1932, Frank Buck wrote about a teenage boy who was eaten by a pet 25 ft reticulated python in the Philippines. According to Buck, the python had escaped and when it was found they could recognize a human child shape inside the snake, which was later turned out to be the son of the snake's owner. [14]
In Burma, an 8-year-old child was supposedly eaten by a 6 meters (20 ft) specimen in 1972.[15]
Basanti Tripura, an 38-year-old Bangladeshi woman from Rangamati District was killed on November 18, 2003, by a "10-foot-long python". The animal was killed during its attempt to eat the woman; if the size is correct, it is almost certain that it would not have succeeded. Though the identity of the snake was not reported, it was either P. reticulatus or P. molurus (Indian python) based on location and size.[16]
Ee Heng Chuan, a 29 year-old rubber tapper, was found dead with his head in a python's mouth. Apparently his shoulders were too large for the snake to swallow and the man was stuck in the snake's mouth.[17]
Considering the known maximum prey size, it is technically possible for a full-grown specimen to open its jaws wide enough to swallow a human child, teenager, or even a small adult, although the flaring shoulders of Homo sapiens would pose a major problem. The victim would almost certainly be dead by the time the snake started swallowing. At least in the 1998 and 2003 incidents, the victims were gathering food or wood in the forest when they happened upon the snakes. While there are no eyewitnesses for the 1998 case, Tripura apparently startled the snake so that the initial attack might have been defensive rather than motivated by hunger, as seems likely in the death of Chine (if the latter did actually happen). In any case, it is unlikely that any but the largest specimens are able to kill, let alone eat, an adult human, except if the victim is caught unaware as in the 2003 incident.[