Iguana 11.3 b&w text


IGUANA  •  VOLUME 11, NUMBER 3  •  SEPTEMBER 2004 167

The Neotropical treeboa genus Corallus is currently comprised
of six species with mainland distributions from Guatemala

to southeastern Brazil, including insular populations off Brazil,
Venezuela, and Panama. Two additional species occur in the West
Indies on the St. Vincent and Grenada banks.

The two largest of the eight species are the Emerald Treeboa
(Corallus caninus) and the Mangrove (or Caribbean Coastal)
Treeboa (Corallus ruschenbergerii). Corallus caninus has a broad dis-
tribution in the Amazon basin and the Guianas. Corallus ruschen-
bergerii has a more limited range from southern Costa Rica,
through Panama, and into northern Colombia, northern
Venezuela (including Isla Margarita), and Trinidad and Tobago.
These snakes probably do not occur sympatrically (or syntopi-
cally) with C. caninus. This species is probably the longest of the
treeboas with a total length reaching or surpassing 2.5 m.

Corallus ruschenbergerii exhibits a wide range of dorsal col-
oration, including dingy yellow, subdued shades of red, gray, and
a variety of shades of brown. The dorsal pattern usually is com-
posed of rhomboidal shapes, although this pattern is not always
discernible.

Mangrove Treeboas are nocturnal and forage in trees and
bushes. The boas forage actively by moving slowly through the
vegetation with frequent tongue-flicks on leaf and branch surfaces,
or they use a sit-and-wait (= ambush) strategy, wherein they
assume a head-down posture and wait for prey to come to them.
Younger (smaller) snakes use the active foraging mode and older
(larger) individuals exhibit the ambush strategy. This coincides
with an ontogenetic shift in diet from predominantly birds in
smaller boas to one primarily of rodents (murids, including intro-
duced Mus and Rattus) in large snakes. Bats are consumed occa-
sionally, and C. ruschenbergerii from Costa Rica and Panama are
known to eat Basilisk lizards (Basiliscus spp.).

Although the Mangrove Treeboa lives up to its common
name and occurs in mangrove habitat in every country through-
out its geographic range, it also lives in a variety of other habitats,
including rainforest, gallery forest, and deciduous forest. It often
is associated with water, and is particularly abundant along the
shores of lakes, rivers, reservoirs, and marine coastal situations
(Caribbean Sea). Like other members of the Corallus hortulanus
complex (C. cookii, C. grenadensis, and C. hortulanus), all of which
are typically inhabitants of edge habitat, Mangrove Treeboas are
frequently encountered in highly disturbed situations such as road
cuts and even around (and occasionally in) people’s homes.

Reference
Henderson, R.W. 2002. Neotropical Treeboas: Natural History of the

Corallus hortulanus Complex. Krieger Publ. Co., Malabar, FL.

S P E C I E S  P R O F I L E

The Mangrove Treeboa 
(Corallus ruschenbergerii)

Robert W. Henderson

Milwaukee Public Museum

A Mangrove Treeboa (Corallus ruschenbergerii). Photograph by
Richard A. Sajdak.

IGUANA  •  VOLUME 11, NUMBER 3  •  SEPTEMBER 2004 167SPECIES PROFILE