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The Snake Portal

Snakes are elongated, limbless, carnivorous reptiles of the suborder Serpentes (/sɜːrˈpɛntiːz/). Like all other squamates, snakes are ectothermic, amniote vertebrates covered in overlapping scales. Many species of snakes have skulls with several more joints than their lizard ancestors, enabling them to swallow prey much larger than their heads (cranial kinesis). To accommodate their narrow bodies, snakes' paired organs (such as kidneys) appear one in front of the other instead of side by side, and most have only one functional lung. Some species retain a pelvic girdle with a pair of vestigial claws on either side of the cloaca. Lizards have independently evolved elongate bodies without limbs or with greatly reduced limbs at least twenty-five times via convergent evolution, leading to many lineages of legless lizards. These resemble snakes, but several common groups of legless lizards have eyelids and external ears, which snakes lack, although this rule is not universal (see Amphisbaenia, Dibamidae, and Pygopodidae).

Living snakes are found on every continent except Antarctica, and on most smaller land masses; exceptions include some large islands, such as Ireland, Iceland, Greenland, the Hawaiian archipelago, and the islands of New Zealand, as well as many small islands of the Atlantic and central Pacific oceans. Additionally, sea snakes are widespread throughout the Indian and Pacific oceans. Around thirty families are currently recognized, comprising about 520 genera and about 3,900 species. They range in size from the tiny, 10.4 cm-long (4.1 in) Barbados threadsnake to the reticulated python of 6.95 meters (22.8 ft) in length. The fossil species Titanoboa cerrejonensis was 12.8 meters (42 ft) long. Snakes are thought to have evolved from either burrowing or aquatic lizards, perhaps during the Jurassic period, with the earliest known fossils dating to between 143 and 167 Ma ago. The diversity of modern snakes appeared during the Paleocene epoch (c. 66 to 56 Ma ago, after the Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event). The oldest preserved descriptions of snakes can be found in the Brooklyn Papyrus. (Full article...)

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George Went Hensley (May 2, 1881 – July 25, 1955) was an American Pentecostal minister best known for popularizing the practice of snake handling. A native of rural Appalachia, Hensley experienced a religious conversion around 1910: on the basis of his interpretation of scripture, he came to believe that the New Testament commanded all Christians to handle venomous snakes.

Hensley was part of a large family that had moved between Tennessee and Virginia, before settling in Tennessee shortly after his birth. Following his conversion, he traveled through the Southeastern United States, teaching a form of Pentecostalism that emphasized strict personal holiness and frequent contact with venomous snakes. Although illiterate, he became a licensed minister of the Church of God (Cleveland, Tennessee) in 1915. After traveling through Tennessee for several years conducting Church of God-sanctioned services, he resigned from the denomination in 1922. Hensley was married four times and fathered thirteen children. He had many conflicts with his family members because of his drunkenness, frequent travels, and inability to earn steady income, factors cited by his first three wives as reasons for their divorces. (Full article...)

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... that the stargazer snake eel sometimes has a shrimp perched on its head?
... that it can be hard to know which Snake is which?
... that the Churah Valley kukri snake was discovered because of an Instagram post?
... that the tomb of the overseer of every cultivated place and every desert place threatens grave robbers with crocodiles and snakes?
... that Isabel Cooper painted live snakes while holding them in her hand?
... that following the introduction of the round goby to Lake Erie, the Lake Erie watersnake's population recovered enough to be removed from the U.S. threatened species list?

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...that the Scarlet King Snake can be distinguished from the Coral Snake by the mnemonic "red and yellow, kill a fellow" and "red and black venom lack"?
... that venom is thought to have had a single origin in the evolutionary history of snakes?
... that in local New Guinea folklore, the magic-man sends the Papuan black snake to kill enemies?
... that the limestone quarries near Ein Yabrud in the Judean Mountains have produced the only fossils for the extinct snakes Pachyrhachis and Haasiophis?
...that the San Francisco garter snake is an endangered species capable of digesting toxic newts but is not found in San Francisco?

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Featured snake-related articles - George Went Hensley - List of snakes of Trinidad and Tobago
Good snake-related articles - Agkistrodon piscivorus - Bitis arietans - Bitis gabonica - Black mamba - Black-necked spitting cobra - Eastern green mamba - Forest cobra - Hydrophiinae - Many-banded krait - Nerodia clarkii - Russell's viper - Snake scales - Vipera berus - Western green mamba

General images

The following are images from various snake-related articles on Wikipedia.

Image 1The world's most venomous snake, based on LD₅₀, is the inland taipan of Australia. (from Venomous snake)
Image 2Snake coiled on a stick in Oklahoma. It was brumating in a large pile of wood chips, found by this landscaper after he bulldozed the pile in late autumn 2018. (from Snake)
Image 3Eupodophis descouensi (from Snake)
Image 4Snake meat, in a Taipei restaurant (from Snake)
Image 5Wart snake (Acrochordus granulatus) (from List of snakes of South Asia)
Image 6The reverse side of the throne of Pharaoh Tutankhamun with four golden uraeus cobra figures. Gold with lapis lazuli; Valley of the Kings, Thebes (1347–37 BCE). (from Snake)
Image 7Dolichophis jugularis preying on a sheltopusik (from Snake)
Image 8Common Tree Snake (from Australian snake habitats)
Image 9Narcisse Snake Dens welcome sign (from Narcisse Snake Dens)
Image 10Most common symptoms of any kind of snake bite envenomation. Furthermore, there is vast variation in symptoms between bites from different types of snakes. (from Snake)
Image 11A line diagram from The Fauna of British India by G. A. Boulenger (1890), illustrating the terminology of shields on the head of a snake (from Snake)
Image 12Ballcourt marker from the Postclassic site of Mixco Viejo in Guatemala. This sculpture depicts Kukulkan, jaws agape, with the head of a human warrior emerging from his maw. (from Snake)
Image 13Mouse embryo 12 day post fertilization side by side with corn snake embryo 2 days post ovo-positioning. (from Snake)
Image 14Rod of Asclepius, in which the snake, through ecdysis, symbolizes healing (from Snake)
Image 15The skeletons of snakes are radically different from those of most other reptiles (as compared with the turtle here, for example), consisting almost entirely of an extended ribcage. (from Snake)
Image 16Diagram illustrating differential somite size due to difference in somitogenesis clock oscillation (from Snake)
Image 17Medusa (1597) by the Italian artist Caravaggio (from Snake)
Image 18Australia-Oceania Köppen Map (from Australian snake habitats)
Image 19The Binocellate Cobra(naja naja) (from List of snakes of South Asia)
Image 20Eupodophis descouensi (from Snake)
Image 21A common watersnake shedding its skin (from Snake)
Image 22The garter snake has been studied for sexual selection. (from Snake)
Image 23Crawling prints of a snake (from Snake)
Image 24Golden tree snake climbing a flower (from Snake)
Image 25Common Blind Snake (Ramphotyphlops braminus) (from List of snakes of South Asia)
Image 26Vipera berus, one fang in glove with a small venom stain, the other still in place (from Snake)
Image 27An adult Barbados threadsnake, Leptotyphlops carlae, on an American quarter dollar (from Snake)
Image 28Innocuous milk snakes are often mistaken for coral snakes whose venom is deadly to humans. (from Snake)
Image 29A neonate sidewinder rattlesnake (Crotalus cerastes) sidewinding (from Snake)
Image 30Eupodophis descouensi hind leg (from Snake)
Image 31African egg-eating snake eating an egg (from Snake)
Image 32Tetrapodophis (from Snake)
Image 33A red-sided garter snake (from Narcisse Snake Dens)
Image 34The Indian cobra is the most common subject of snake charmings. (from Snake)
Image 35Approximate world distribution of snakes (from Snake)
Image 36Close up of a red-sided garter snake
Image 37Snakes composing a bronze kerykeion from the mythical Longanus river in Sicily (from Snake)
Image 38The lateral view of a king cobra's skull showing fangs (from Venomous snake)

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A Yellow-billed shrike (Binominal name: Corvinella corvina) is a passerine bird in the shrike family. The prey appears to be a species of snake in the family Typhlopidae or Leptotyphlopidae.
Photo credit: Sumeet Moghe