How Do Snakes Mate?

Snakes have several fascinating reproductive tricks up their sleeves (scales?). Learn about the wild world of dual penises, delayed fertilization, egg incubation, and mating balls in this episode of BrainStuff, based on this article: https://animals.howstuffworks.com/snakes/how-do-snakes-mate.htm

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to brain Stuff, a production of I Heart Radio.
Hey brain Stuff, Lauren bog Obam here. You may have
heard about the birds and the bees, and the flowers
and the trees, But what about the snakes. How do
snakes mate? Some species, including a few very big ones,

(00:22):
can actually procreate without having sex. That's called parthenogenesis, and
it's one of the many reproductive oddities will be exploring today.
To answer this question, we've got to make like a
black mamba, one of the fastest living snakes, by the way,
and cover a lot of ground. Welcome to the wild,
weird world of dual penises, delayed fertilization, mama python incubators,

(00:46):
and springtime mating balls. Okay, let's start with getting together.
When snakes flick their tongues, they're picking up airborne chemical
signatures like the pheromone trails made by singles in their area.
Male garter snakes, how snakes, and racers have all been
observed trailing mature female snakes with this technique. The strategy

(01:12):
doesn't always work. Sea snakes, for example, can easily lose
track of a would be partner under water. Besides, pheromone
trails naturally degrade with the passage of time, but when
partners do meet, the courtship rituals can take on many forms.
Paper about this subject describes chin rubbing, tail quivering, and
coital neck biting. In numerous species, male snakes compete and

(01:36):
wrestle with each other for access to female snakes. For
North American rat snakes, this can take on the form
of each combatant rearing up and then trying to pin
his rival's head to the ground. No snake has longer fangs,
and the gaboon viper, whose venom dispensing teeth can grow
over two inches or five centimeters in length. Come breeding season,

(01:58):
the male snakes not only wrestle aggressively strike at one another. However,
the snakes do this with closed mouths, keeping those infamous
fangs at bay. When it comes to actual intercourse. Two
as a couple, but three or more isn't an unexpected crowd.
A species like garter snakes, copper heads, and anacondas all

(02:19):
form the occasional mating ball or breeding ball. These are
writhing heaps created when several males all swarm over a
single female in an attempt to mate. More than a
dozen participants may be involved. The reproductive organs of both
sexes are housed in the cloaca, which is a multi
purpose orifice located on the underside of a snake's tail.

(02:42):
List serves as the excretory opening for the digestive system
and for urine as well as the opening to the
reproductive organs instant. Only male snakes and lizards have two
penises apiece. These reptiles are endowed with a paired sex
organ called the hemy penis. There's a right hemmy penis

(03:02):
and a left hemmy penis, each connected to one of
the testicles. Only one penis is used during any given
instance of intercourse, but that doesn't mean it's counterpart, never
seasoning action. The second could very well come into play
if the male finds himself a second mate shortly afterward.
The hemy penis are often covered in little spikes or hooks.

(03:24):
These may enable the males to prolong sexual intercourse or
to do a better job of hanging on to their partners,
doing it not always an easy feat for lugless animals.
Also to improve his chances of siring offspring, a male
red sided garter snake, for example, will clog his partner's
cloaca by secreting a thick gelatinous plug temporary barrier. The

(03:46):
plug keeps his sperm from spilling out, and it blocks
rival males from leaving their sperm behind. A Meanwhile, female
snakes can using pockets of folded tissue, keep sperm isolated
but still liable inside their bodies for very long periods
of time, proactively choosing when to let them fertilize her eggs.

(04:08):
In two thousand five, a western diamond back rattlesnake who
had been living alone in captivity, rendered herself pregnant and
gave birth to a litter of offspring. To accomplish this,
the mother reptile used sperm should held onto for about
six years. Sometimes male snakes aren't needed for reproduction at all.
This has been observed in the green anaconda, which is

(04:31):
the world's heaviest snake, weighing upward of four hundred and
forty pounds that's two hundred kilos. Genetic testing reveals the
female green anaconda can practice parthena genesis, impregnating themselves with
no male contact whatsoever. And Burmese pythons, those extra large
snakes that have become notorious in recent years for successfully

(04:53):
invading the Florida Everglades might be able to pull off
the same feat. Here's a difference between pythons and anacondas
though the former lay eggs while the ladder give birth
to live young. Other live bearing serpents include rattlesnakes and
garter snakes. Upon laying a fresh batch of eggs, a

(05:14):
mother python will wrap her body around it. That loving
squeeze keeps the clutch from losing too much water and
promotes healthy yolk development. Very frequently, the devoted parent remains
coiled until the eggs hatch, and king cobra mothers painstakingly
build nests for their eggs out of sticks and bamboo leaves,
a unique behavior among snakes. The finished nests can be

(05:37):
as big as four feet over one meter in diameter.
Egg Sitting is one thing, but it's pretty rare for
snakes to take care of their actual babies. Female pit
vipers thus deserve special recognition. Multiple species of these venomous
reptiles are now known to watch over their newborn progeny
for several days after the little snakes first come into

(05:59):
the world. Today's episode is based on the article ever
wondered how Snake's mate on how stuff Works dot Com,
written by Mark Mancini. Brain Stuff is production of by
Heart Radio in partnership with how stuff Works dot Com,
and it's produced by Tyler Klang. Before more podcasts in
my heart Radio, visit the I heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,

(06:21):
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.