Facts About Snakes

I have always found snakes to be interesting, and not scary. I must have gotten the wrong family genes somewhere. I mean, I would not go get friendly with the poisonous kind, but the others are interesting to me. When my dad was a scoutmaster, I would go to the Jamboree--and totally surprise the guys buy petting the snakes and other wild creatures. I do not know about sand vipers, however.

Snakes are amazing creatures. They have the ability to adapt to there environment very well. I was watching a show a few weeks ago about the Reticulated Python. This snake can grow to over 20 feet and will eat a goat a month!!! It also lives in deep dark caves and eats bats. It has pits on its face that enables it to "see" its prey even in total darkness. They did an expariment with one to see how its pits work. They covered the snakes eyes with black tape to mimic darkness. Then they put him in a cage with a rat. Now within two minutes the snake had senced the rat and went for it. He only struck once and had it!! It was neat to see. So even without there eyes Retics can catch prey! Did you know that when a snake tries to get away from you he might regurgitate his last meal? He spits up what he has in his belly to make a distraction and to get away faster. Once the food is out the snake can move fast. I saw one of these retics about 5 feet long regurgitate 2 bats!! One bat is good but to have two means that his pits work and he is a succesfull hunter in the dark! Snakes are amazing.

Reptiles are wonderful creatures and it saddens me that many hear the word snake and immediately think "Kill it". Many people think snakes are slimy and this is just not true, just as it's not true that we need to be terribly afraid of these creatures. They are more scared of us! People need to use caution whenever they are in an area where other creatures have their habitat, that's just common sense...isn't it?

eww, snakes. I hate snakes. There are six types of poisonous snakes in my home state of Arkansas.