---
title: "What the sources say about the King Cobra | AnimalTracks.wiki"
description: "33 claims from the King Cobra profile, each beside the words of the source that backs it."
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---

# What the sources say about the King Cobra (*Ophiophagus hannah*)

> 33 claims from the King Cobra profile, each beside the words of the source that backs it. A "..." marks a cut in a quote and [brackets] an insertion.

Profile: [King Cobra](https://animaltracks.wiki/animals/king-cobra/)

## Tan, Bourges & Tan (2021). King Cobra and snakebite envenomation: on the natural history, human-snake relationship and medical importance of Ophiophagus hannah. Journal of Venomous Animals and Toxins including Tropical Diseases.

https://doi.org/10.1590/1678-9199-jvatitd-2021-0051

| The page says | The source says |
| :--- | :--- |
| growling acoustic hiss | it would raise its upper body above the ground, spreading its hood while emitting a loud growling hiss |
| specialized predator of other snakes | The King Cobra primarily feeds on other snakes, both venomous and non-venomous |
| Royal shaolin predator that hunts other predators | The King Cobra primarily feeds on other snakes, both venomous and non-venomous (note: vibe.reason: the 'other predators' are the snakes it eats.) |
| Tropical forests | King Cobras usually inhabit tropical forests (note: Was 'Dense tropical rainforests': ADW says 'dense or open forest'. biome.ts still reads 'tropical forests' as rainforest, so matchups are unchanged.) |
| across South and Southeast Asia | It widely distributes throughout Southeast Asia on the Malay Archipelago ... and in parts of India (note: Range of the pre-split species. Under Das et al. 2024, O. hannah in the strict sense runs from eastern Pakistan and northern and eastern India to central Thailand and Indo-China, which is still South and Southeast Asia.) |
| Primarily other snakes, including rat snakes, pythons, cobras, kraits, and vipers; it probably takes other reptiles and small mammals too when food is scarce | The King Cobra primarily feeds on other snakes, both venomous and non-venomous, but it probably also feeds on other reptiles and small mammals when food is scarce ... A broad range of preys has been documented including rat snakes, pythons, cobras, kraits, vipers and other King Cobras |
| Can deliver more than a gram of neurotoxic venom, measured dry, in a single bite | King Cobra is capable of delivering more than 1 gram (dry weight) of venom in one bite (note: The source's own framing is 'In author's experience'. 'Measured dry' keeps the dry-weight measure, and 'Can' keeps 'capable of'.) |
| neurotoxic venom | Envenomation by this snake is highly lethal, manifested mainly by neurotoxicity and local tissue damage. |
| Ophiophagus, literally translates to "snake-eater" | Ophio -: snake, - phagous : eating, according to the Greek etymology |
| hunting and eating other snakes, including venomous vipers, kraits, and pythons | A broad range of preys has been documented including rat snakes, pythons, cobras, kraits, vipers and other King Cobras (note: Was 'pit vipers': the source says vipers.) |
| One bite can deliver more than a gram of neurotoxic venom, measured dry | King Cobra is capable of delivering more than 1 gram (dry weight) of venom in one bite |
| field scientists often describe king cobras as placid snakes that would rather put on a threat display than attack | field scientists often described the King Cobra as a placid snake, only manifesting aggressive behavior when disturbed or cornered, while preferring visual and acoustic threats display over attack |
| Ophiophagus translates literally from Greek as snake-eater | Ophio -: snake, - phagous : eating, according to the Greek etymology |
| The king cobra specializes in hunting and eating other snakes, both venomous and non-venomous, including rat snakes, pythons, cobras, kraits, and vipers, though it probably takes other reptiles or small mammals when food is scarce | The King Cobra primarily feeds on other snakes, both venomous and non-venomous, but it probably also feeds on other reptiles and small mammals when food is scarce ... A broad range of preys has been documented including rat snakes, pythons, cobras, kraits, vipers and other King Cobras |

## Young (1991). Morphological basis of “growling” in the king cobra, Ophiophagus hannah. Journal of Experimental Zoology.

https://doi.org/10.1002/jez.1402600302

| The page says | The source says |
| :--- | :--- |
| Rather than a typical snake hiss, it lets out a deep growl | The "growl" of the king cobra (Ophiophagus hannah) differs from the "typical" snake hiss in consisting solely of frequencies below 2,500 Hertz, with a dominant frequency near 600 Hertz. |
| Structural analysis of its airway suggests the sound comes from tracheal diverticula, air-pocket structures in the windpipe that act as low-frequency resonating chambers | Structural analysis of the upper respiratory tract of O. hannah suggests that the "growl" is produced by tracheal diverticula functioning as low-frequency resonating chambers. (note: 'suggests' restored: the body had stated it flatly. 'Air-pocket structures in the windpipe' glosses 'tracheal diverticula', matching the FAQ.) |
| a 1991 study of the defensive sounds of 21 snake species found its growl consists solely of frequencies below 2,500 hertz, with a dominant frequency near 600 hertz | A bioacoustic analysis is conducted on the defensive sounds produced by 21 species of snakes. ... The "growl" of the king cobra (Ophiophagus hannah) differs from the "typical" snake hiss in consisting solely of frequencies below 2,500 Hertz, with a dominant frequency near 600 Hertz. (note: 1991 is the paper's publication year (Journal of Experimental Zoology 260).) |
| below a typical snake hiss's roughly 3,000-to-13,000-hertz span | The "typical" snake hiss is described as having a broad-frequency span (from roughly 3,000 to 13,000 Hertz) and a dominant frequency near 7,500 Hertz. |
| Structural analysis of its airway suggests the growl is produced by tracheal diverticula, air-pocket structures in the windpipe that act as low-frequency resonating chambers | Structural analysis of the upper respiratory tract of O. hannah suggests that the "growl" is produced by tracheal diverticula functioning as low-frequency resonating chambers. |

## Ophiophagus hannah (king cobra). Animal Diversity Web, University of Michigan.

https://animaldiversity.org/accounts/Ophiophagus_hannah/

| The page says | The source says |
| :--- | :--- |
| bamboo thickets, and agricultural borders | bamboo thickets, adjacent agricultural areas |
| Female king cobras build a nest, pushing leaves and branches into a pile where the heat of rotting plants incubates the eggs | The female pushes leaves and branches into a nest pile where the eggs are incubated by the elevated temperatures of decomposition. (note: San Diego Zoo corroborates the nest-building ('she builds a nest with leaves'). 'The only snakes known to build a nest' was cut: only National Geographic states it, and no peer-reviewed source was found.) |
| then stay on top to guard them | The female remains on top of the nest to guard the eggs |

## King cobra, facts and photos. National Geographic.

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/reptiles/facts/king-cobra

| The page says | The source says |
| :--- | :--- |
| Up to eighteen feet of hooded crown | King cobras can reach 18 feet in length (note: A maximum, so the tagline carries 'up to'. The writer's 'Eighteen-foot' read as a typical size; GWR gives the average as 3-4 m.) |
| Vulnerable | The International Union for Conservation of Nature lists king cobras as vulnerable to extinction, but hasn't assessed the risk of the new individual species. (note: Tan et al. 2021 agrees ('globally "Vulnerable" by the International Union for Conservation of Nature'). The listing is for the pre-2024 single species; iucnredlist.org refuses automated reads, so the assessment itself is a hand check.) |
| Able to reach eighteen feet | King cobras can reach 18 feet in length |
| the king cobra (Ophiophagus hannah) is the longest venomous snake on the planet | King cobras can reach 18 feet in length, making them the longest of all venomous snakes. |
| sounds almost like a dog's | emit a hiss that sounds almost like a growling dog |
| making king cobras the longest venomous snakes in the world | King cobras can reach 18 feet in length, making them the longest of all venomous snakes. (note: Was 'the longest venomous snake species': king cobras are now four species, and the source says 'king cobras' collectively.) |

## Cobra. San Diego Zoo Animals & Plants.

https://animals.sandiegozoo.org/animals/cobra

| The page says | The source says |
| :--- | :--- |
| When confronted, the king cobra can lift up to a third of its body off the ground | If it feels threatened, the king cobra flares its hood ... and rears itself up. How high? Up to one-third of its body length. |
| in some cases high enough to look an adult human in the eye | In some cases, this can make the cobra taller than an average man. (note: Taller than an average man puts its head at least at an adult's eye level. National Geographic says it 'can literally "stand up" and look a full-grown person in the eye'. The zoo's 'In some cases' is kept, because a third of a typical 3-4 m snake is well short of eye level.) |
| flaring its wide ribbed neck hood | They have specialized muscles and ribs in the neck that can flare out when the cobra feels threatened. |

## Longest venomous snake (specimen). Guinness World Records.

https://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/world-records/468357-longest-venomous-snake-specimen

| The page says | The source says |
| :--- | :--- |
| King cobras average three to four meters (about ten to thirteen feet) long | averages 3–4 m in length (note: 3-4 m is 9.8-13.1 ft.) |
| the longest specimen on record, caught in Malaysia in 1937 and kept at London Zoo, had reached 5.71 meters (about eighteen feet nine inches) by 1939 | the longest specimen on record – captured in April 1937 near Port Dickson in Negeri Sembilan, Malaysia, and put on display at London Zoo in the UK – had attained a length of 5.71 m by autumn 1939 (note: 5.71 m is 18 ft 8.8 in. It grew to that length in captivity. Port Dickson is on the Malay Peninsula, which Das et al. 2024 assign to O. bungarus, so under the split the record is a Sunda king cobra's.) |