Interesting Rattlesnake Habits

Posted on June 15, 2005

The Environmental News Network reports that researchers have discovered rattlesnakes have interesting behaviors like swimming and climbing trees. The researchers tracked 28 different snakes with tiny radio transmitters.

For example, they swim and climb trees. Some males go more than six miles a year to look for mates. One snake caught rainwater in its funnel-shaped coil and drank from its own cup.

The snakes seem to prefer living on the edge of the woods and at the start of a road or a field. And despite all the fear they cause some people only one person died from a rattler bite in 2003.

"Edges aren't all that bad," said Corey Anderson, a doctoral student in biology. "Timber rattlesnakes are thought of as these sensitive, secret creatures. ... It'd be shocking to people if they knew how many den locations I have along I-44."
That would shock many people who accept the idea that snakes are a threat to humans. There were 1,245 rattlesnake bites, with only one death, reported to the American Association of Poison Control Centers in 2003. That compares to the 44 people killed by lightning in 2003, according to the National Weather Service.

ANIMALS
SNAKES