Reptilia · Squamata
Dasypeltis mediciBianconi, 1859
East African Egg Eater
Photograph by Jklamo, CC BY-SA, via Wikimedia Commons
A nocturnal, meat-eating snake from the Afrotropic region, reaching 110 cm nose to tail.
Also called Eastern Forest Egg-eater.
Reptilia › Squamata › Colubridae › Dasypeltis
- Grows to
- 1100mm
- greatest recorded
- Eats
- Carnivorous
- Active
- Nocturnal
- Lives up to
- 8.6years
Longer than 75% of all colubrid snakes 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 98 to 3,800 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
34 sourced facts, each taken from a named scientific dataset. How to read these.
Cited from a dataset unless a row is marked otherwise.
Standing in the world
- Still living
- Extant
- Conservation status
- Least Concern
- Status assessed · the year the Red List last looked
- 2019
The animal itself
- Limbs
- None
- Colour on the back
- Black, Brown
- Pattern on the back
- Banded, blotched, striped
- Pupil
- Vertical slit
- Venomous
- No
- Fangs
- At the back of the mouth
- Longest recorded life
- 8.6years
Stark et al. 2020
Size
- Length snout to vent · greatest recorded
- 912mm3 ft
- Length nose to tail · greatest recorded
- 1100mm3 ft 7 in
- Hatchling length · nose to tail
- 235mm9.25 in
- Body mass · greatestcomputed
- 164.8g5.8 oz
- Body mass at hatching
- 7g0.25 oz
1000 mm total length (Feldman et al. 2016), 500-900 (Wilkey and Terrell 2017), Pietersen et al. 2021 (max SVL 679 mm in males, 912 mm in females), Marais 2022 (adults average 40-60 cm, max 90 cm, hatchling just over 20 cm), Spawls et al. 2023 (50-110 cm, hatchlings 23-27 cm)
snakes only in this source
computed from length by a family-level allometric equation, not weighed
How it lives
- Diet
- Carnivorous
- Active
- Nocturnal
- Where it lives
- Arboreal, terrestrial
- Habitat
- Forest
- Biome
- Tropical & Subtropical Grasslands, Savannas & Shrublands
- Region
- Afrotropic
- Mainland or island
- Mainland
- Highest it lives · above sea level
- 1000m
- Range size
- 289,804km²
exclusively bird eggs (Pietersen et al. 2021), bird eggs (Marais 2022)
Broadley and Blaylock 2013; Pietersen et al. 2021 say it is similar to scabra and that scabra is nocturnal, nocturnal (Marais 2022)
semi-arboreal (Bars-Closel et al. 2017)
0-1000 (O'Shea 2018)
Breeding
- Reproduction
- Oviparous
- Average clutch
- 17eggs
- Eggs or young per clutch
- 6–28eggs
Feldman et al. 2015, Spawls et al. 2023
6-28 (Marais 2005, O'Shea 2018, Pietersen et al. 2021, Marais 2022, Spawls et al. 2023), 6 (Wilkey and Terrell 2017)
Naming and history
- Suborder
- Serpentes
- Infraorder
- Alethinophidia
- Subspecies
- No
- Described by
- Bianconi
- Moved to another genus · since it was first described
- No
- Described in
- 1859
- Type locality
- Mozambique
Keeping one
3 ft 7 in × 21.5 in × 5 ft 5 in(110 × 55 × 165 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 7 in (1100 mm), at 1 × 0.5 × 1.5 times it, following the German federal welfare standard — how this is worked out.
No preferred body temperature has been recorded for East African Egg Eater. Rather than repeat a number from a care sheet, this page leaves it out.
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.
18kJ per day
Worked out for an animal of 165 g, the heaviest recorded for East African Egg Eater — 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.
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 female mean
- — 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 · snout to vent
- — Largest male · snout to vent
- — Largest female · shell length
- — Largest male · shell length
- — Hatchling length · snout to vent
- — Largest juvenile · snout to vent
- — Largest juvenile · shell length
- — Egg length
- — Egg width
- — Body mass · a typical adult
- — Body mass · adult female, mean
- — Preferred body temperature · chosen in a laboratory gradient
- — Body temperature when active · measured in the wild
- — Eats arthropods
- — Eats vertebrates
- — Eats plant matter
- — How it hunts
- — How the young develop
- — Gestation or incubation
- — Mean clutch · smallest reported
- — Mean clutch · largest reported
- — 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
- — Population trend
- — 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 Colubridae
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). Dasypeltis medici. Retrieved 2026-09-08, from https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/dasypeltis-medici
@misc{dasypeltis_medici_2026,
title = {Dasypeltis medici},
author = {{The Reptile & Amphibian Encyclopedia}},
year = {2026},
url = {https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/dasypeltis-medici}
}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.