Latest Snake Stories

The biophysics of snakebitesFor years Professor Leo von Hemmen, a biophysicist at the TU Muenchen, and Professor Bruce Young, a biologist at the University of Massachusetts Lowell, have been researching the sense of hearing in snakes. While discussing the toxicity of their snakes, it dawned on them that only few snakes inject their venom into their victims' bodies using hollow poison fangs. Yet, even though the vast majority of poisonous reptiles lack hollow fangs, they are effective...

Giving low-dose adrenaline to patients who have been bitten by a poisonous snake before treatment with the appropriate antivenom is safe and reduces the risk of acute severe reactions to the treatment, but giving promethazine has no such effect and giving hydrocortisone may actually be harmful. These findings from a study led by Asita De Silva from the Clinical Trials Unit, Faculty of Medicine, University of Kelaniya in Ragama, Sri Lanka, are important because in some countries where snake...

WILMINGTON, N.C., April 19, 2011 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- On April 15th, the U.S. Association of Reptile Keepers (USARK) received a response from the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) to a long standing appeal and Request for Correction under the Information Quality Act (IQA). In rejecting USARK's contention that the USGS failed to maintain a high standard of quality for their work as required by IQA, the USGS stated, "This document was not designated by the USGS as a highly influential...

Officials in New Delhi have injected microchips into snakes in an attempt to regulate the snake charmers in India. Delhi's forest department chief Deepak Shukla said Wednesday that the chips will allow officials to ascertain whether individual snakes have been registered by their owners. India implemented laws in the late 1990s proscribing the commercial use of wild animals, including performances with lives snakes.  The state government in Delhi offered an amnesty for charmers in 2003,...

WEST CONSHOHOCKEN, Pa., Feb. 25, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- Confronting a rattler may be a minor challenge for Rooster Cogburn in the Coen brothers' Oscar-nominated remake of True Grit, but proper handling of poor Mattie's snakebite was a major ordeal in the old West. The tough-as-nails U.S. Marshall unknowingly perpetuates Hollywood myth by doing precisely the opposite of proper snakebite protocol, although the hero does get it right when it comes to the need for speed in seeking immediate...

There's a reason why Hollywood makes movies like Arachnophobia and Snakes on a Plane: Most people are afraid of spiders and snakes. A new paper published in Current Directions in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, reviews research with infants and toddlers and finds that we aren't born afraid of spiders and snakes, but we can learn these fears very quickly. One theory about why we fear spiders and snakes is because so many are poisonous; natural...

...and how you can avoid snakebites in the first place ROSEMONT, Ill., Dec. 1, 2010 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Should you be the victim of a snakebite, the best thing you can do is get to a hospital as quickly as possible, according to a new review article from the Journal of the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons (JAAOS). Current medical treatments, including new medications and surgery, if necessary, are far more effective for snakebites than anything you can do on your own....

By Dawn Fuller, University of CincinnatiIn the wild, how does a snake climb a vertical surface without slipping? An examination involving boa constrictors is published by University of Cincinnati researchers. In a unique study involving young boa constrictors, University of Cincinnati researchers put snakes to work on varying diameters and flexibility of vertical rope to examine how they might move around on branches and vines to gather food and escape enemies in their natural habitat.The...

A researcher at Virginia Tech has been studying an unusual breed of Asian snake that can glide long distances in the air in order to unlock its secrets. The "flying snakes" of Southeast Asia, India and southern China are able to glide in the air without fixed wings.  Video of the reptiles show they undulate from side to side to create an aerodynamic system.  It allows the snakes to travel from the top of the biggest trees in the region to a spot about 780 feet away from the...

By Mick Kulikowski, North Carolina State UniversityIn a finding that upends decades of scientific theory on reptile reproduction, researchers at North Carolina State University have discovered that female boa constrictors can squeeze out babies without mating.More strikingly, the finding shows that the babies produced from this asexual reproduction have attributes previously believed to be impossible.Large litters of all-female babies produced by the "super mom" boa constrictor show...