That king cobra fed on those snakes. So the snakes were also the supply food for the king snakes and other cannibalistic steaks. As the technology improved and reptile houses began having humidity control, temperature control and concentration on breeding efforts, captive-bred specimens became the norm where it was rare back in the ’30s or ’40s if somethin’ was born at the zoo, it was a result of having been bred in the wild. But now zookeepers were beginning to be more refined and the efforts were in captive breeding. Today, almost the entire reptile collection are captive bred either in our zoo or by training surplus with other zoos so that you don’t have to replenish from the wild. And besides, the environment is so well, so good in the average reptile house that snakes live much longer in captivity than they do in the wild. It’s not unusual for a snake to live 25 to 30 years in captivity. And breeding ’em in captivity, sometimes you have many generations of captive bred and you trade with other zoos.
