Reptilia · Squamata
Rhamnophis aethiopissaGünther, 1862
Large-eyed Green Treesnake
Photograph placed in the public domain, CC0, via iNaturalist
A tree-dwelling, day-active, meat-eating snake from the Afrotropic region, reaching 150 cm nose to tail.
Also called Splendid Dagger-tooth Tree snake.
Once published as Thrasops aethiopissa — those names reach this page.
Reptilia › Squamata › Colubridae › Rhamnophis
- Grows to
- 1500mm
- greatest recorded
- Eats
- Carnivorous
- Active
- Diurnal
- Lives
- Arboreal
Longer than 88% 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
- 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
- 869mm2 ft 10 in
- Length snout to vent · adult female mean
- 812mm2 ft 8 in
- Length nose to tail · greatest recorded
- 1500mm4 ft 11 in
- Female length · mean, nose to tail
- 1243mm4 ft 1 in
- Hatchling length · nose to tail
- 320mm12.5 in
- Body mass · greatestcomputed
- 146.8g5.2 oz
1300 mm total length (Feldman et al. 2016), Pietersen et al. 2021 (max SVL 948 mm in males, 950 mm in females; hatchlings 300-340 mm TL), Pauwels and Colyn 2023 (1 female 812 mm SVL, 1243 mm total length; 1 male 869 mm SVL, 1354 mm total length), Trape 2023 (70-150 cm)
snakes only in this source
computed from length by a family-level allometric equation, not weighed
How it lives
- Diet
- Carnivorous
- Active
- Diurnal
- Where it lives
- Arboreal
- Habitat
- Forest, Savanna
- Biome
- Tropical & Subtropical Moist Broadleaf Forests
- Region
- Afrotropic
- Mainland or island
- Mainland
- Lowest it lives · above sea level
- 1300m
- Highest it lives · above sea level
- 2000m
- Range size
- 4,486,318km²
amphibians (O'Shea 2018), birds lizards and small mammals, also frogs (Pietersen et al. 2021), mainly frogs (Malonza and Bwong 2023), lizards, birds and mammals (Trape 2023)
O'Shea 2018, Pietersen et al. 2021, Malonza and Bwong 2023, Trape 2023
1308 n=1 (Bittencourt-Silva 2019), 0-2000 (O'Shea 2018)
Breeding
- Reproduction
- Oviparous
- Average clutch
- 6.5eggs
- Eggs or young per clutch
- 5–17eggs
Feldman et al. 2015
up to 17 (O'Shea 2018), 5-17 (Pietersen et al. 2021)
Naming and history
- Suborder
- Serpentes
- Infraorder
- Alethinophidia
- Subspecies
- Rhamnophis aethiopissa aethiopissa GÜNTHER 1862 Rhamnophis aethiopissa ituriensis SCHMIDT 1923 Rhamnophis aethiopissa elgonensis LOVERIDGE 1929
- Described by
- Günther
- Moved to another genus · since it was first described
- No
- Described in
- 1862
- Type locality
- West Africa.
Keeping one
3 ft 8 in × 2 ft 6 in × 7 ft 5 in(113 × 75 × 225 cm)
Minimum length × width × height, for one animal. Bigger is always better.
The standard sizes snakes as a fraction of total length: 0.75 × 0.5 × 1.5.
Lives in vegetation, so height and climbing structure matter more than floor space.
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 11 in (1500 mm), at 0.75 × 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 Large-eyed Green Treesnake. 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.
17kJ per day
Worked out for an animal of 147 g, the heaviest recorded for Large-eyed Green Treesnake — 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 male mean
- — Length snout to vent · adult mean
- — 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 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
- — 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
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). Rhamnophis aethiopissa. Retrieved 2026-09-08, from https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/rhamnophis-aethiopissa
@misc{rhamnophis_aethiopissa_2026,
title = {Rhamnophis aethiopissa},
author = {{The Reptile & Amphibian Encyclopedia}},
year = {2026},
url = {https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/rhamnophis-aethiopissa}
}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.