The Moscow Zoo has announced the birth of Siamese cobras. The institution has been successfully breeding these rare snakes for a long time, but for the first time visitors will have the opportunity to see the babies with their own eyes.
"Two months ago, a clutch of eggs was received from our Siamese cobras - this is a rather rare and extremely poisonous species. Twenty-three eggs were placed in an incubator. Nine babies have already hatched from them, and it is possible that three more will appear," the statement says.
This year, the incubator was first placed on display in the "Hut of Poisonous Snakes" exhibition. Thus, each visitor now has a chance to see the moment a cobra is born.
The incubator maintains a humidity of up to 90% and a temperature of 29-23 degrees. The eggs spend more than two months there.
When the babies are born, they crawl into the incubator tray. The babies spend a day there, after which they are transferred to a temporary container.
In the container, the humidity remains the same, the temperature may be slightly lower - 25-26 degrees. A local heating spot is provided, as well as many shelters necessary for snakes. The babies spend two to three days there.
Then the cobras are transferred to a large terrarium. There they live on a mixture of mulch and gravel, as well as sphagnum moss for wet areas.
"Interestingly, the sex of cobras depends on the incubation temperature. By adjusting it, it is possible to determine the ratio of females and males that will be born. We focus on averaged parameters to obtain a uniform group composition," the zoo said.
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