Reptilia · Squamata
Philothamnus semivariegatusSmith, 1840
Spotted Bush Snake
Photograph placed in the public domain, CC0, via iNaturalist
A day-active, meat-eating snake from the Afrotropic region, reaching 130 cm nose to tail.
Also called Spotted Green Snake, Variegated Green Snake.
Reptilia › Squamata › Colubridae › Philothamnus
- Grows to
- 1300mm
- greatest recorded
- Eats
- Carnivorous
- Active
- Diurnal
- Lives
- Arboreal, terrestrial
Longer than 83% 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
32 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
- 2014
The animal itself
- Limbs
- None
- Colour on the back
- Green
- Pattern on the back
- Banded, blotched
- Pupil
- Round
- Fangs
- At the back of the mouth
Size
- Length snout to vent · greatest recorded
- 866mm2 ft 10 in
- Length nose to tail · greatest recorded
- 1300mm4 ft 3 in
- Hatchling length · nose to tail
- 260mm10 in
- Body mass · greatestcomputed
- 145.6g5.1 oz
1300 mm total length (Feldman et al. 2016), Barends and Maritz 2021 (SVL: 462-793, mean 593.5 ± 95.23, n = 10; female SVL: mean 573 ± 50.25, range 513-615, n = 4), Conradie et al. 2021: Largest female: 866 + 384 mm (PEM R27377); largest male: 847 + 367 (truncated) mm, 600-1200 (Wilkey and Terrell 2017), Pietersen et al. 2021 (max SVL 825 mm in males, 850 mm in females; neonates 230-300 mm TL), Marais 2022 (adults average 50-80 cm, seldom exceeding 1.3 m, hatchlings 23-30 cm), Spawls et al. 2023 (70-130 cm TL, hatchlings 22-25 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
- Diurnal
- Where it lives
- Arboreal, terrestrial
- Habitat
- Forest, Savanna, Shrubland
- Biome
- Tropical & Subtropical Grasslands, Savannas & Shrublands
- Region
- Afrotropic
- Mainland or island
- Mainland
- Highest it lives · above sea level
- 2000m
- Range size
- 16,158,392km²
frogs (Conradie et al. 2021), frogs and lizards (Pietersen et al. 2021, Malonza and Bwong 2023), amphibians and reptiles (van Huyssteen 2023), Marais 2022: mainly lizards, and frogs (but not toads), Spawls et al. 2023 (mostly lizards, also frogs)
van Huyssteen 2023
This handsome diurnal snake is commom in dry savanna, including thorn bush (Broadley and Blaylock 2013), diurnal (Pietersen et al. 2021, van Huyssteen 2023, Marais 2022, Malonza and Bwong 2023, Spawls et al. 2023)
Arboreal&Terrestrial (Bates et al. 2014, Wilkey and Terrell 2017, Pietersen et al. 2021), arboreal, saxicolous and terrestrial (van Huyssteen 2023), arboreal (Malonza and Bwong 2023), largely arboreal, also terrestrial (Spawls et al. 2023)
from lowland forest to as high as 2000 (Bates et al. 2014), 1828 (Wilkey and Terrell 2017), 0-1500 (Malonza and Bwong 2023), 0-2000 (Spawls et al. 2023)
Breeding
- Reproduction
- Oviparous
- Average clutch
- 7.5
- Eggs or young per clutch
- 3–12eggs
Feldman et al. 2015
midpoint of the reported range — Meiri, 2024, Glob. Ecol. Biogeogr., 33:e13812
3-16 (Chippaux and Jackson 2019), 3-12 (Marais 2005, Wilkey and Terrell 2017, Pietersen et al. 2021, Marais 2022, Spawls et al. 2023)
Naming and history
- Suborder
- Serpentes
- Infraorder
- Alethinophidia
- Subspecies
- No
- Described by
- Smith
- Moved to another genus · since it was first described
- Yes
- Described in
- 1840
- Type locality
- South Africa
Keeping one
4 ft 3 in × 2 ft 2 in × 6 ft 5 in(130 × 65 × 195 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 4 ft 3 in (1300 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 Spotted Bush Snake. 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.
16kJ per day
Worked out for an animal of 146 g, the heaviest recorded for Spotted Bush Snake — 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
- — Longest recorded life
- — 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
- — 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
- — Venomous
- — 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). Philothamnus semivariegatus. Retrieved 2026-09-08, from https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/philothamnus-semivariegatus
@misc{philothamnus_semivariegatus_2026,
title = {Philothamnus semivariegatus},
author = {{The Reptile & Amphibian Encyclopedia}},
year = {2026},
url = {https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/philothamnus-semivariegatus}
}Sources
- Meiri, S. (2024). SquamBase — a database of squamate (Reptilia: Squamata) traits. Global Ecology and Biogeography. Public domain (CC0).
- Moura, M. R. et al. TetrapodTraits: a database of 33,281 tetrapod species. Used under CC BY 4.0. Observed values only; this encyclopedia does not publish its imputed predictions.
- 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.