The Hunt For Red Meat

A rattlesnake or other pit viper usually first detects distant prey by scent. When a mammal, like a rat or a rabbit, has passed through an area, it leaves a trail of odor on the ground. Dogs can readily pursue foxes, raccoons, rabbits, and other animals by their scent trail, and believe it or not, so can a snake-by picking up the scent with its sensitive tongue. Furthermore, a pit viper's heat-detecting pits are so sensitive that they can detect faint traces of a mammal's body heat if it has passed over the ground in the previous twenty minutes or so. Following the trail as rapidly but noiselessly as possible, the snake eventually comes close enough to employ its heat-sensitive pits to zero in accurately. Some pit vipers are "sit and wait" specialists, often waiting patiently for days near animal trails or a quail feeding station for food to come to them.

If the prey is fairly large, like a rabbit or squirrel, the snake strikes, stabs with its fangs to inject venom, and withdraws instantly. It follows the weakened prey until it dies and then swallows it whole. If the prey is small, like a bird or small rat, the pit viper will not withdraw after its strike but will hold on until the snamal dies in its mout. Birds in particular are held tightly because a wounded bird can still fly some distance, leaving the snake without a trail to follow.

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