This tiny but rather large-headed Japanese has one of the most oddly
specific diets in the animal kingdom; its asymmetrical
jaws are adapted
for preying entirely upon snails…so long as their shells spiral
clockwise. A once rare mutation is known to produce snails with
counter-clockwise shells, and since these provide a greater challenge to
the snakes, the “mirrored” snails may be growing steadily more common.
Atractaspis
The “stilleto” snake has also been called a “mole viper” and
“burrowing asp.” Though highly venomous, it spends most of its time
tunneling through soil with little or no room to open its jaws and
strike. Instead, it possesses switchblade-like “pop out” fangs, which it
hooks into subterranean prey by jerking its head backwards, hooking
into their flesh.
Scolecophidians
“Blindsnakes” or “threadsnakes” are another group of burrowers,
nonvenomous but quite a bit weirder than our last serpent. With eyes
covered over by thin scales,tubular worm-like bodies and mouths tucked
underneath their heads, these animals are completely adapted to a
fossorial (burrowing) lifestyle, and feed primarily on soft subterranean
insects such as termites and ant larvae. Some species even possess
tiny, movable finger-like sensory growths on their snouts,much like a
star-nosed mole.
Eunectes murinus
No list of snakes is complete without the green anaconda, the
heaviest alive today and one of the world’s longest predators. While
their typical recorded length is up to sixteen feet, reports of
anacondas over thirty feet in length have circulated for centuries. Like
all constrictors, they wrap their bodies around prey to restrict
breathing and kill by asphyxiation, swallowing the prey whole when it
finally stops struggling.
Naja ashei
With their deadly venom and famous “hooded” threat display, cobras
are easily the world’s most iconic, most dramatized reptiles, and none
are as fearsome as the various “spitting” cobras, who can spray venom
several feet from their fangs with muscular contraction, often aiming
deliberately for the eyes of attackers and capable of causing blindness.
Naja ashei, a species from Kenya, is the largest and most venomous
spitting cobra in the world, reaching lengths of up to nine feet from
head to tail.
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