Reptilia · Squamata
Antaresia childreniGray, 1842
Children's Python
Photograph by Matt from Melbourne, Australia, CC BY, via Wikimedia Commons
_(8692425238).jpg){kind=link}
A nocturnal, meat-eating snake from the Australo-Pacific region, reaching 100 cm nose to tail.
Also called Large-blotched Python, Stimsons Python.
Once published as Antaresia stimsoni — those names reach this page.
Reptilia › Squamata › Pythonidae › Antaresia
- Grows to
- 1000mm
- greatest recorded
- Eats
- Carnivorous
- Active
- Nocturnal
- Lives up to
- 30years
Longer than only 3% of all pythons anyone has measured.
The bar is the rank itself: its length is the share of the family this animal exceeds. The chart below is the family’s real spread, on a logarithmic scale because body length here runs from 750 to 7,900 mm. The solid rule is this animal. Every bar is a count of real species, and nothing on this figure is estimated.
What is known
45 sourced facts, each taken from a named scientific dataset. How to read these.
Cited from a dataset unless a row is marked otherwise.
Two of these figures disagree
Length snout to vent (greatest recorded) is given as 1,060, and Length nose to tail (greatest recorded) as 1,000 — but snout to vent is part of the animal's total length, not more than it. They come from different sources and both are shown exactly as those sources give them.
Standing in the world
- Still living
- Extant
- Conservation status
- Least Concern
- Status assessed · the year the Red List last looked
- 2017
- Population trend
- Stable
The animal itself
- Limbs
- None
- Colour on the back
- Black, Brown
- Pattern on the back
- Banded, blotched
- Pupil
- Vertical slit
- Venomous
- No
- Fangs
- None
- Longest recorded life
- 30years
- Preferred body temperature · chosen in a laboratory gradientmeasured
- 28.7°C
Stark et al. 2020
Size
- Length snout to vent · adult female mean
- 751mm2 ft 6 in
- Largest female · snout to vent
- 688mm2 ft 3 in
- Largest male · snout to vent
- 718mm2 ft 4 in
- Hatchling length · snout to vent
- 228.3mm9 in
- Body mass · greatestcomputed
- 812.9g1.8 lb
- Body mass · a typical adult
- 384g13.5 oz
- Body mass at hatchingmeasured
- 13.5g0.48 oz
- Length snout to vent · greatest recordeddisputed
- 1060mm3 ft 6 in
- Length nose to tail · greatest recordeddisputed
- 1000mm3 ft 3 in
1000 mm total length (Feldman et al. 2016), Lettoof et al. 2023 (860 mm SVL, mass 208 g), Shine 1994 (hatchlings 22.6 cm SVL, 59 males 39-99 cm, mean 68.8, 25 females 48.5-94, mean 71.8 cm; for stimsoni 23.5 cm hatchling SVL, 21 males 55.2-127 cm mean 87.6 cm SVL, 20 females 65-106, mean 85.2 cm SVL), Shine 1994 (59 males 39-99, mean 68.8 cm SVL; 25 females 48.5-94, mean 71.8 cm SVL; hatchling SVL 226 mm)
snout-vent length; the source column mixes this with straight carapace length
computed from length by a family-level allometric equation, not weighed
AnAge rates this record "acceptable"
How it lives
- Diet
- Carnivorous
- How it hunts
- Sit and wait
- Active
- Nocturnal
- Where it lives
- Arboreal, terrestrial
- Habitat
- Forest, Grassland, Savanna, Shrubland
- Biome
- Tropical & Subtropical Grasslands, Savannas & Shrublands
- Region
- Australo-Pacific
- Mainland or island
- Mainland
- Highest it lives · above sea level
- 60m
- Range size
- 1,672,354km²
mammals and birds (Lettoof et al. 2023)
Sit (Feldman 2015)
Cogger 2018, Lettoof et al. 2023
Arboreal&Terrestrial (Scharf et al. 2015, Cogger 2018)/terrestrial (Lettoof et al. 2023)
Breeding
- Reproduction
- Oviparous
- Gestation or incubation
- 55days
- Average clutch
- 6.5eggs
- Eggs or young per clutch
- 3–20eggs
- Mean clutch
- 6.5–10.5eggs
- Egg length
- 40mm1.5 in
- Egg width
- 26mm1 in
Feldman et al. 2015, Meiri et al. 2019
mean 6.5 (Meiri et al. 2019, Lettoof et al. 2023), 7-20 (O'Shea 2018), mean 10.5 (Meiri et al. 2019 for stimsoni), , Shine 1994 (3-12, mean 6.5, n = 4 clutches)
Naming and history
- Suborder
- Serpentes
- Infraorder
- Alethinophidia
- Subspecies
- No
- Described by
- Gray
- Moved to another genus · since it was first described
- Yes
- Described in
- 1842
- Type locality
- Australia
Keeping one
3 ft 3 in × 19.5 in × 4 ft 11 in(100 × 50 × 150 cm)
Minimum length × width × height, for one animal. Bigger is always better.
The standard sizes snakes as a fraction of total length: 1 × 0.5 × 1.5.
Recorded both on the ground and climbing, so this is the larger of the two rules in every dimension.
Mindestanforderungen an die Haltung von Reptilien (Sachverständigengutachten), German Federal Ministry for Nutrition, Agriculture and Forestry, Animal Welfare Division, 10 January 1997. The standard states these floor areas are recommendations rather than binding limits.
From this animal’s own total length of 3 ft 3 in (1000 mm), at 1 × 0.5 × 1.5 times it, following the German federal welfare standard — how this is worked out.
In a laboratory thermal gradient this species settled at 84 °F (28.7 °C).
Preferred body temperature, recorded in a laboratory gradient where the animal could choose freely. A measurement of the animal, not a setting for a thermostat.
Feeding
A prey item should be between the same width as the widest part of the snake's body and about 1.5 times that width.
Widely used across snake husbandry references. An alternative formulation gives prey at 10-15% of the snake's body mass. This is established practice, not a measurement.
76kJ per day
Worked out for an animal of 813 g, the heaviest recorded for Children's Python — so it is the top of the range, not a figure for a particular animal. Weigh yours and the number will be lower.
An upper estimate, not a feeding target, and not veterinary advice. The equation covers only what an animal burns staying alive, so a growing, gravid or recovering animal needs more — and it was measured on wild animals, which move far more than one in an enclosure. Body condition and a vet who knows the species are what a feeding decision should rest on. Where this comes from.
Morphs
0 with peer-reviewed genetics behind them, 3 resting on breeder consensus. Most references present both with the same confidence.
What each pairing produces → · Two genes at once →
- Albinobreeder consensus
No black pigment, leaving a pale tan and cream animal with red eyes.
- Granitebreeder consensus
Blotching broken into fine even speckling along the whole animal.
- Patternlessbreeder consensus
Blotching lost, leaving an evenly coloured tan or fawn snake.
What nobody knows
These are not gaps in our research. No scientific dataset records them for this species — and saying so is information you cannot get from a reference that simply leaves a field out.
- — Length snout to vent · adult male mean
- — Length snout to vent · adult mean
- — Female length · mean, nose to tail
- — Length nose to tail · adult male mean
- — Length nose to tail · adult mean
- — Largest female · shell length
- — Largest male · shell length
- — Hatchling length · nose to tail
- — Largest juvenile · snout to vent
- — Largest juvenile · shell length
- — Body mass · adult female, mean
- — Body temperature when active · measured in the wild
- — Eats arthropods
- — Eats vertebrates
- — Eats plant matter
- — How the young develop
- — Clutches in a year
- — Clutches a year · fewest
- — Clutches a year · most
- — First breeds from · youngest recorded
- — First breeds by · oldest recorded
- — Hatchling length · smallest recorded
- — Hatchling length · largest recorded
- — Age at first breeding · female
- — Mature from · youngest recorded
- — Mature by · oldest recorded
- — Size at maturity · smallest recorded
- — Size at maturity · largest recorded
- — Body temp in the wild · lowest mean recorded
- — Body temp in the wild · highest mean recorded
- — Sex decided by
- — Red List criteria
- — Active season · shortest recorded
- — Active season · longest recorded
- — Density · lowest recorded
- — Density · highest recorded
- — Home range · largest recorded
- — Active in
- — Lowest it lives · above sea level
Others in Pythonidae
Take this data
Everything on this page is available as data under CC BY 4.0 — use it freely, credit it, no permission needed.
This species as JSON · the whole dataset
Cite this page
The Reptile & Amphibian Encyclopedia (2026). Antaresia childreni. Retrieved 2026-09-08, from https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/antaresia-childreni
@misc{antaresia_childreni_2026,
title = {Antaresia childreni},
author = {{The Reptile & Amphibian Encyclopedia}},
year = {2026},
url = {https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/antaresia-childreni}
}Sources
- Meiri, S. (2024). SquamBase — a database of squamate (Reptilia: Squamata) traits. Global Ecology and Biogeography. Public domain (CC0).
- Oskyrko, O. et al. (2024). ReptTraits: a comprehensive dataset of ecological traits in reptiles. Scientific Data. Used under CC BY 4.0.
- Catalogue of Life (dataset 3LR), used under CC BY.
- AnAge, Human Ageing Genomic Resources (de Magalhães et al.), used under CC BY 3.0.