Category Science

These snakes have fangs up to five centimetres long- the longest among snakes. The fangs are in the front of the mouth, and hinge back into the mouth when not in use. Their venom is very strong, and they are known to eat big rats, even antelopes.

Physical Description

The Gaboon vipers’ coloration is a combination of light and dark brown, pink and purple arranged in diamonds and stripes along its back.  Light and dark lines radiate from around its small eyes.

It has a short tail, and its broad head mimics a fallen leaf, right down to the central vein. This striking pattern is excellent camouflage in the snake’s native habitat, helping it blend into the leaf litter on the forest floor.

Size

Gaboon vipers are the largest vipers in Africa, weighing more than 45 pounds (20 kilograms) and reaching lengths of more than 6 feet (1.8 meters). The largest individuals have heads nearly 6 inches (15 centimeters) across at their widest point.

Native Habitat

These vipers live in rainforests and wet areas in parts of Central, East and West Africa. They are terrestrial and can be found on the forest floor.

Food/Eating Habits

They eat small and medium-sized mammals and birds. Gaboon vipers are passive hunters, waiting concealed to strike at whatever small creatures pass within range. Most snakes strike and release, but this viper holds on until its prey dies.

Gaboon vipers have a placid nature and very rarely bite humans. Most bites occur when the snake is stepped on before it has an opportunity to get away. If harassed, it will raise the upper part of its body and hiss in threat before actually striking.

In addition to its unwillingness to bite, the viper can control whether it injects venom and how much, so the result of a strike can range from no effect to rapid death. A hungry snake will strike at almost any sideways movement, so some bites might well be a result of mistaken identity.

At the Smithsonian’s National Zoo, Gaboon vipers eat mice and rats.

Reproduction and Development

Females can have 50 to 60 babies at a time. The young are born live.

Lifespan

Gaboon vipers live for about 20 years.

Credit : Nationalzoo & conservation biology institute 

Picture Credit : Google 

Reptiles are scaly-skinned creatures such as crocodiles, lizards and snakes. They are cold-blooded, which means they depend on the Sun for warmth and have to move back and forth between warm and cold places to maintain the right temperature in their bodies. They may spend hours basking in the sun to gain enough energy to hunt for food. Reptiles can survive on limited food, but they cannot live in cold places.

Here are a few things you may not know about them:

1. Lizards can’t feel warm or cold the way we can. But their movements and speed are affected by the outside temperature. So for instance, while they can’t feel cold, cold will make them slow. Imagine instead of saying “I feel cold” you would simply not be able to move as quickly.
2. Green iguanas become immobile when the temperature drops below 40 degrees. Since they often like to sit in trees, when the weather in places where they live, like South Florida, gets very cold they have been known to drop out of trees. While these iguanas may appear to be dead, they are often simply cold and will thaw out in the sun. However, you should never move a frozen iguana as they often become frightened as they thaw. When they become frightened, they become unpredictable. Experts would rather you leave them where they are or notify a professional to have them moved.
3. As prevalent as the Green Iguana is in Southern Florida, it is not indigenous. They were originally brought to the area as pets and were later released into the wild where they thrived. We also see this in pythons and lionfish. Never release an animal into the wild. It will affect the local ecosystem and can, in some cases, mar it for decades.
4. Evidence of the earliest reptiles dates back to 312 million years ago.
5. Although reptiles are often found in warm areas, they actually inhabit every continent but Antarctica.
6. Reptiles come in a broad range of sizes. Of the living versions, not including anything that’s extinct, The tiniest is the gecko at under an inch and the largest on record is the saltwater crocodile, which can reach about 20 feet long.
7. A crocodile needs a tenth of the food a lion does for survival. That’s why the crocodile can go up to half a year without eating, if necessary. Because of this, crocodiles can survive temporary food shortages that might kill off or cause other animals to leave an area for food. A crocodile will stay in an area long after its main food source is gone or it may look for another one. That’s the reason why when new developments are built around water, these animals may stay long after others have left due to human invasion.
8. All reptiles use lungs to breathe.
9. Most reptilians must hold their breath while swallowing. This is not the case for crocodilians, who have a secondary palate that allows them to continue breathing even while their mouth is full of struggling prey.
10. The turtles’ lungs are attached to the inside of the top of their shells.
11. On land, female green sea turtles do not breathe while they’re walking. They either rest and take a breath or wait until they are in the nest they’ve created.
12. Reptiles’ skin is watertight, meaning they do not get soggy and water does not penetrate their scales.
13. Reptiles shed their skin periodically. The younger they are, the more often they shed.
14. Snakes shed from head to tail in one whole section, which you know if you ever come across a snakeskin. Some snakeskins, at first glance, almost look like the snake they came from. On the other hand, lizards shed their skin in patchy sections.
15. Some tortoises have disproportionately large bladders. Charles Darwin noted that the Galapagos turtle can store 20% of its body weight in its bladder.
16. Some reptiles that live in desert climates have secondary bladders that allow them to store water for several months.
17. Reptiles digest food slower than mammals do. This is due to a slower metabolism but also the fact that many reptiles do not masticate (or chew) on their prey. Many just swallow it whole.
18. Large reptiles, like crocodiles and constrictors, can live several months on a single meal.
19. Some reptiles that eat plants and lack the teeth to chew them actually swallow rocks to aid in the digestion of this plant matter.
20. Reptiles are considered less intelligent than mammals because the size of their brain relative to their body is smaller. However, larger reptiles have been known to play (the Komodo dragon) and show cooperation (monitors), so this may be a slightly unfair assumption.
21. Most reptiles can see colors better than most mammals can.

Credit : Alligator wildlife discovery centre 

Picture Credit : Google

Dragonflies are large, fast-flying insects that can dart at speeds up to 60 km per hour. Their four wings move independently of one another and make a rattling sound. Dragonflies can also fly backwards.

1. Dragonflies Are Ancient Insects

Long before the dinosaurs roamed the Earth, dragonflies took to the air. Griffenflies (Meganisoptera), the gigantic precursors to modern dragonflies had wingspans of over two feet and dotted the skies during the Carboniferous period over 300 million years ago.

2. Dragonfly Nymphs Live In the Water

There’s a good reason why you see dragonflies and damselflies around ponds and lakes: They’re aquatic! Female dragonflies deposit their eggs on the water’s surface, or in some cases, insert them into aquatic plants or moss. Once hatched, the nymph dragonfly spends its time hunting other aquatic invertebrates. Larger species even dine on the occasional small fish or tadpole. After molting somewhere between six and 15 times, a dragonfly nymph is finally ready for adulthood and crawls out of the water to shed its final immature skin.

3. Nymphs Breath Through Their Anus

The damselfly nymph actually breathes through gills inside its rectum. Likewise, the dragonfly nymph pulls water into its anus to facilitate gas exchange. When the nymph expels water, it propels itself forward, providing the added benefit of locomotion to its breathing.

4. Most New Dragonfly Adults Are Eaten

When a nymph is finally ready for adulthood, it crawls out of the water onto a rock or plant stem and molts one final time. This process takes several hours or days as the dragonfly expands to its full body capacity. These newly emerged dragonflies, known at this stage as teneral adults, are soft-bodied, pale, and highly vulnerable to predators. Until their bodies fully harden they are weak flyers, making them ripe for the picking. Birds and other predators consume a significant number of young dragonflies in the first few days after their emergence.

5. Dragonflies Have Excellent Vision

Relative to other insects, dragonflies have extraordinarily keen vision that helps them detect the movement of other flying critters and avoid in-flight collisions. Thanks to two huge compound eyes, the dragonfly has nearly 360° vision and can see a wider spectrum of colors than humans. Each compound eye contains 28,000 lenses or ommatidia and a dragonfly uses about 80% of its brain to process all of the visual information it receives.

6. Dragonflies Are Masters of Flight

Dragonflies are able to move each of their four wings independently. They can flap each wing up and down, and rotate their wings forward and back on an axis. Dragonflies can move straight up or down, fly backward, stop and hover, and make hairpin turns—at full speed or in slow motion. A dragonfly can fly forward at a speed of 100 body lengths per second (up to 30 miles per hour).

7. Male Dragonflies Fight for Territory

Competition for females is fierce, leading male dragonflies to aggressively fend off other suitors. In some species, males claim and defend a territory against intrusion from other males. Skimmers, clubtails, and petaltails scout out prime egg-laying locations around ponds. Should a challenger fly into his chosen habitat, the defending male will do all he can to chase away the competition. Other kinds of dragonflies don’t defend specific territories but still behave aggressively toward other males that cross their flight paths or dare to approach their perches.

8. Male Dragonflies Have Multiple Sex Organs

In nearly all insects, the male sex organs are located at the tip of the abdomen. Not so in male dragonflies. Their copulatory organs are on the underside of the abdomen, up around the second and third segments. Dragonfly sperm, however, is stored in an opening of the ninth abdominal segment. Before mating, the dragonfly has to fold his abdomen in order to transfer his sperm to his penis.

9. Some Dragonflies Migrate

A number of dragonfly species are known to migrate, either singly or en masse. As with other migratory species, dragonflies relocate to follow or find needed resources or in response to environmental changes such as impending cold weather. Green darners, for example, fly south each fall in sizeable swarms and then migrate north again in the spring. Forced to follow the rains that replenish their breeding sites, the globe skimmer—one of several species that’s known to spawn in temporary freshwater pools—set a new insect world record when a biologist documented its 11,000 mile trip between India and Africa.

10. Dragonflies Thermoregulate Their Bodies

Like all insects, dragonflies are technically ectotherms (“cold-blooded”), but that doesn’t mean they’re at the mercy of Mother Nature to keep them warm or cool. Dragonflies that patrol (those that habitually fly back and forth) employ a rapid whirring movement of their wings to raise their body temperatures. Perching dragonflies, on the other hand, who rely on solar energy for warmth, skillfully position their bodies to maximize the surface area exposed to sunlight. Some species even use their wings as reflectors, tilting them to direct the solar radiation toward their bodies. Conversely, during hot spells, some dragonflies strategically position themselves to minimize sun exposure, using their wings to deflect sunlight.

Credit : Thought co ?

Picture Credit : Google