Quote:
Originally Posted by bronxzoofrank
Hi...thanks for mentioning this - I should have noted that the photo is not of the snake when she has reached full size; but yes, I was on hand for all weights and measurements. When measuring wild anacondas, we always took 3 measurements, as we found that the nature of their musculature etc. allows for a good deal of contraction/expansion. Several snakes that we re-captures were inches shorter than when first encountered, others seemed to add far too much size given apparent age and time between captures. So we did this with the captive retic as well, but there is some room for error, even after 3 measurements.
There are well-documented cases of snakes over 23 feet; I've worked with several,
Still waiting for that 30 footer...best, Frank
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I think we have more chance of finding a t-rex than a 30ft snake lol :-)
A fellow snake keeper here in the uk saw Samantha and he agreed she was the longest snake he's ever seen, this was shortly before her death and he estimated her between 22-23ft.
I doubt muscle contractions would make a 3-4 foot difference.
You very lucky indeed if you have dealt with several snakes over 23 foot as the only one I've seen was on a documentary and even then the measurement of 23.5 foot didn't seem accurate.
It's the same with Fluffy being quoted at 24 foot when she was only 20 foot 1inch. To the general public they wouldn't know the difference between 20 and 24 foot but to snake keepers the size difference would be immense and hence a true 26 foot snake would be a sight to be hold.
I've seen no evidence of Samantha being massively bigger than any of the other giant snakes of modern time, 'Fragant flower' 'fluffy' the 'medusas' etc to name a few.
I for one would love Samantha to have been over 26 foot but I haven't seen any evidence of this unfortunately, as much as I never saw evidence that 'Baby the burmese' was over 27 foot nor the magical '33 foot retic that was shot nearly 100 years ago.
I have seen only retics around the 21-22 foot mark and these snakes really are the rarest of the rare. Samantha is definitley within good company with these snakes and may have been even a bit bigger..........but theres no way in the pictures I've seen nor the evidence provided by another fellow giant snake keeper in the uk that she's over 3 foot bigger than the likes of 'Fragant Flower'.
Also she was measured on a documentary at around 23 foot and she was already fullly grown by then.
I agree she was a 1 in a million snake and the biggest of the big but I think we'll be very very lucky to find a true snake over 25 foot never mind 30 foot.
All the best
Neil :-)