Hulking hunters like Burmese pythons could also be well-known for scarfing up deer, alligators and different huge prey (SN: 11/25/15). However one unassuming little African snake could take the title for many outsized meals. The nonvenomous, almost toothless Dasypeltis gansi can open its mouth wider than another snake of its dimension, biologist Bruce Jayne studies August 8 within the Journal of Zoology.
D. gansi, typically referred to as the Gans’ egg-eater, swallows chicken eggs entire, cracks them with its backbone and ingests the contents earlier than spitting out the shells. On the College of Cincinnati in Ohio, Jayne inspected 15 egg-eaters starting from about 20 to about 90 centimeters lengthy. After euthanizing the animals, he slid more and more huge 3-D printed cylinders into their gaping maws to find out the largest factor they may swallow.
The largest Gans’ egg-eater Jayne examined had a roughly 1-centimeter-wide head however might swallow a cylinder about 5 centimeters throughout. Earlier knowledge present {that a} petite Burmese python (Python molurus bivittatus) of the identical size might gobble up prey simply 4.4 centimeters huge. The western diamondback rattlesnake (Crotalus atrox) rivaled the python’s present for gulp, however no different species got here shut.
The egg-eater can open so huge as a result of the tender tissue between the ideas of its left and proper decrease jaws on the “chin” is so stretchy. “In Burmese pythons, about 40 p.c of that gape space is a results of the stretch of the pores and skin between the decrease jaws, however these guys edge out the pythons,” Jayne says, with about half of the Gans’ egg-eater’s gape on account of tender tissue stretch.
This species could have advanced such a powerful stretch as a result of, in contrast with prey that different snakes eat, corresponding to rodents, “an egg is tremendous quick,” he says. “You have got a restricted means to have a really lengthy egg. However if you happen to get your mouth wider, then you’ll be able to devour these bigger eggs.”
Thus far, most mouth dimension has been measured for under 13 of greater than 3,500 recognized species of snakes. “As a result of the quantity of stretch within the pores and skin varies so radically in numerous species,” Jayne says, “it’s far more tough to measure gape than merely take some calipers on a preserved museum specimen and measure bones.”
Jayne plans to maintain investigating mouth sizes for a greater diversity of snakes, corresponding to those who dine on fish. These knowledge might reveal whether or not egg-eaters actually have the largest gulp for his or her gullet.
