How dangerous is it for snakes to hibernate? Stiff and motionless, unable to escape by rats, is it true that rat slaughter?
All statements in this article are based on reliable sources
When temperatures plummet in the north, wild snakes begin to enter a mysterious hibernation state, an unusual form of dormancy, and unlike hibernating animals such as bears, snakes essentially lose their ability to fight back at this time. They huddle in caves or tree hollows, their bodies almost stiff and motionless, as if they have entered a frozen state.
Hibernation is a survival strategy for snakes, as the temperature decreases, the snake's metabolism slows down, its mobility decreases, and if the temperature continues to drop to near freezing, the snake may unfortunately freeze to death.
Therefore, they usually choose to find a hidden place to hibernate when the temperature drops to around 15 degrees Celsius, so that they can survive for a considerable period of time without eating.
Hibernating snakes face some potential dangers, unlike other animals, snakes in this state almost lose the ability to fight back, even the usually ferocious snakes, at this time can not resist the attack of rats and other natural enemies, can only let the other party eat themselves.
The real case of snakes being eaten in hibernation once occurred in a zoo in the 80s of the last century, a patterned viper about 1 meter long was in hibernation, but was attacked by several house mice in the park, and the result was that the snake was bitten in many places, the flesh and blood were blurred, and the wound was deep and bone-seeing.
During hibernation, snakes are almost unable to resist external threats, even if they occasionally encounter attacks by natural enemies such as rats, they are helpless, this helpless state sometimes reminds people of some legendary episodes, such as razor rat slaughter, although this sounds exaggerated, but under the laws of the animal kingdom, hibernation snakes are indeed easy to become prey for other creatures.
A vivid example of an incident at the zoo is the discovery and digging of a cobra's hibernation hole by a wild boar, resulting in the cobra being eaten alive by the wild boar.
Snakes are not without self-protection mechanisms, and they usually choose hidden burrows to hibernate to avoid threats, and most threats are difficult to harm hibernation snakes unless the burrows are discovered.
Even in extreme cases, if the snake can choose to migrate before winter to avoid the cold, it can also increase the success rate of wintering, because the snake crawls slowly, has limited physical strength, and needs to hunt for energy during the migration, the probability of successful wintering is relatively low.
It is not wise to artificially awaken a hibernating snake, it is difficult for a snake that has lost its hibernation site to find a new place to take refuge from the cold, and it is impossible to forage for food to replenish its strength, and once forcibly awakened, the hibernating snake will lose their usual calm and instinctively attack any target that comes close, including rescuers, even human kindness can lead to the danger of being bitten.
Snakes hibernate because they lose the ability to function normally in cold environments, unlike hibernating animals such as bears who need to conserve energy, snakes living in tropical areas rarely go into deep hibernation, and they may go into a short-term semi-hibernation state when the temperature drops slightly, but will soon return to normal activities.
Snake breeding is gradually popular, many owners in order to protect pets, will set up a thermostat in the snake house, so that they maintain normal physiological activities throughout the year, so that snakes can also maintain a certain ability to fight back during hibernation, not easy to become prey for other animals, but humans should not interfere with the hibernation of snakes at will, because this is their instinctive behavior, but also in order to survive to make a wise choice.
Information sources: Sohu.com, NetEase
