Reptilia · Squamata
Naja subfulvaLaurent, 1955
Brown forest cobra
Photograph by Simon Tonge, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons
An active by day or night, meat-eating snake from the Afrotropic region, reaching 269 cm nose to tail.
Reptilia › Squamata › Elapidae › Naja
- Grows to
- 2690mm
- greatest recorded
- Eats
- Carnivorous
- Active
- Cathemeral
- Lives up to
- 28years
Longer than 97% of all elapid 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 219 to 5,710 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
30 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
- Population trend
- Stable
The animal itself
- Limbs
- None
- Venomous
- Yes
- Fangs
- At the front of the mouth
- Longest recorded life
- 28years
Malonza and Bwong 2023, in captivity
Size
- Length snout to vent · greatest recorded
- 2050mm6 ft 9 in
- Length nose to tail · greatest recorded
- 2690mm8 ft 10 in
- Hatchling length · nose to tail
- 325mm13 in
- Body mass · greatestcomputed
- 1705g3.8 lb
Wuster et al. 2018 (max 2690 total length, 2016 SVL), Barends and Maritz 2021 (SVL: 650-998, mean 855.29 ± 118.41, n = 7; female SVL: mean 840.5 ± 13.44, range 831-580, n = 2) , usually 1500-2100 but up to 2700 mm (Wilkey and Terrell 2017), Pietersen et al. 2021 (max SVL 2050 mm in males, 1564 mm in females, neonates 250-400 mm TL), Marais 2022 (largest African cobra, average 1.2-1.8 m in adults, max 2.7 m, hatchlings 27-43 cm), Trape 2023 (140-220 cm), Spawls et al. 2023 (1.4-2.7 m, hatchlings 25-40 cm)
snakes only in this source
computed from length by a family-level allometric equation, not weighed
How it lives
- Diet
- Carnivorous
- How it hunts
- Active foraging
- Active
- Cathemeral
- Where it lives
- Arboreal, terrestrial
- Biome
- Tropical & Subtropical Grasslands, Savannas & Shrublands
- Region
- Afrotropic
- Mainland or island
- Mainland
- Highest it lives · above sea level
- 2500m
- Range size
- 1,421,788km²
reptiles, amphibians, mammals and fish (Pietersen et al. 2021, see also van Huyssteen 2023), snake (Rodel et al. 2023, n = 1), amphibians, snakes, birds and small mammals (Marais 2022, Malonza and Bwong 2023), fish, amphibians, reptiles, bird eggs and young mammals (Trape 2023)
van Huyssteen 2023, see also Marais 2022
(Wilkey and Terrell 2017, Pietersen et al. 2021, van Huyssteen 2023, Malonza and Bwong 2023, Trape 2023, Spawls et al. 2023), nocturnal and crepuscular (Marais 2022)
ground, trees and swims well (Wilkey and Terrell 2017, Spawls et al. 2023), terrestrial and arboreal (Pietersen et al. 2021), terrestrial (van Huyssteen 2023), terrestrial but climbs well (Malonza and Bwong 2023)
700-1850 (Laurent 1955), 750-2500 (Malonza and Bwong 2023), 0 to above 2000 (Spawls et al. 2023)
Breeding
- Reproduction
- Oviparous
- Eggs or young per clutch
- 11–26eggs
Pietersen et al. 2021
11-26 (Pietersen et al. 2021, Marais 2022), 15-26 (Spawls et al. 2023)
Naming and history
- Suborder
- Serpentes
- Infraorder
- Alethinophidia
- Subspecies
- No
- Described by
- Laurent
- Moved to another genus · since it was first described
- No
- Described in
- 1955
- Type locality
- Democratic Republic of the Congo
Keeping one
8 ft 10 in × 4 ft 5 in × 13 ft 3 in(269 × 135 × 404 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 8 ft 10 in (2690 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 Brown forest cobra. 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.
146kJ per day
Worked out for an animal of 1,705 g, the heaviest recorded for Brown forest cobra — 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
- — Body mass at hatching
- — Preferred body temperature · chosen in a laboratory gradient
- — Body temperature when active · measured in the wild
- — Eats arthropods
- — Eats vertebrates
- — Eats plant matter
- — How the young develop
- — Gestation or incubation
- — Average clutch
- — 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
- — Colour on the back
- — Pattern on the back
- — Pupil
- — Sex decided by
- — Red List criteria
- — Active season · shortest recorded
- — Active season · longest recorded
- — Density · lowest recorded
- — Density · highest recorded
- — Home range · largest recorded
- — Habitat
- — Active in
- — Lowest it lives · above sea level
Others in Elapidae
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). Naja subfulva. Retrieved 2026-09-08, from https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/naja-subfulva
@misc{naja_subfulva_2026,
title = {Naja subfulva},
author = {{The Reptile & Amphibian Encyclopedia}},
year = {2026},
url = {https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/naja-subfulva}
}Sources
- Meiri, S. (2024). SquamBase — a database of squamate (Reptilia: Squamata) traits. Global Ecology and Biogeography. Public domain (CC0).
- Catalogue of Life (dataset 3LR), used under CC BY.
- Oskyrko, O. et al. (2024). ReptTraits: a comprehensive dataset of ecological traits in reptiles. Scientific Data. Used under CC BY 4.0.