Dear all, my humble response to the preceding posts:
Stefan-A wrote:
“You also know as well as anyone else that there are plenty of supposedly venomoid snakes out there that are far from being venomoid, for example due to botched surgery.”
– I’ve not seen one yet in over 40 years!
Kibakiba wrote:
No one who has even half of a brain would call a gartersnake "Gregswedoshus". Thamnophis fits them. Stop being stupid.
  • Critics said the same about evolution and Broghammerus!

Thamneil – well your comment was so garbled I was unable to offer a comment.
Chris-UK – I note from your bio you wrote for this site that you have been a snake enthusiast for one year. Congratulations!
It is a pity you have closed your mind to learning from someone with over 40 years experience with snakes. That is your loss, not mine.
PS AJH IS PEER REVIEWED!!!!


PPS one of about a million available references here:

CSIRO PUBLISHING - Australian Journal of Zoology

Ecological attributes and trade of white-lipped pythons (Genus Leiopython) in Indonesian New Guinea


Daniel J. D. Natusch A B and Jessica A. Lyons A

A School of Biological, Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW 2052, Australia.
B Corresponding author. Email: d_natusch_14@hotmail.com


Australian Journal of Zoology 59(5) 339-343 CSIRO PUBLISHING - Australian Journal of Zoology
Submitted: 10 February 2012 Accepted: 17 April 2012 Published: 16 May 2012

Abstract White-lipped pythons (WLP) (Genus Leiopython) have been collected from the wild in Indonesian New Guinea and exported for the pet trade since at least 1977. Despite the long duration of trade and recent taxonomic work recognising six different species, virtually nothing is known of the trade dynamics or ecology of these species. Surveys of wildlife traders in Indonesian New Guinea and measurement of 122 WLP provides the first information on trade and ecological attributes of the two most commonly traded species, L. albertisii and L. hoserae. Both species exhibit broadly similar ecological attributes; however, L. hoserae has a longer and wider head than L. albertisii. WLP prey mainly on mammals, although smaller snakes were found to feed on lizards. Reproduction appears to be seasonal with oviposition and hatching occurring in the summer months between December and March. Most trade was in L. albertisii and although traders differentiated between the two species on the basis of colour, both were traded under the name L. albertisii. Examination of CITES export data revealed that in 2004 Indonesia exceeded the government-allocated harvest quota of wild individuals. Although this quota was apparently not exceeded in other years, the results of this study suggest that the unmonitored domestic pet trade and the potential for misdeclaration of wild-caught individuals for export may account for many more snakes than are recorded.
Additional keywords: albertisii, harvest quota, hoserae, pet trade, snake.

References

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Brongersma, L. D. (1953). Notes on New Guinea reptiles and amphibians II. Proceedings of the KoninklijkeNederlandscheAkademie van Wetenschappen, Amsterdam (C) 56, 317–325.

Brongersma, L. D. (1956). Notes on New Guinea reptiles and amphibians IV. Proceedings of the KoninklijkeNederlandscheAkademie van Wetenschappen, Amsterdam (C) 59, 599–610.

CITES (2011). CITES Asian Snake Trade Workshop. Guangzhou, China, 11–14 April.

CITES (2012). CITES Trade Database, UNEP World Conservation Monitoring Centre, Cambridge, United Kingdom. CITES trade database [accessed January 2012].

Forsman, A., and Shine, R. (1997). Rejection of non-adaptive hypotheses for intraspecific variation in trophic morphology in gape-limited predators. Biological Journal of the Linnean Society. Linnean Society of London 62, 209–223.
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Groombridge, B., and Luxmoore, R. (1991). Pythons in Southeast Asia. A review of distribution, status and trade in three selected species. Report to CITES Secretariat, Lausanne, Switzerland.

Hoser, R. (2000). A revision of the Australasian pythons. Ophidia Review 1, 7–27.