Why do snakes hibernate in winter? Why do snakes hibernate?

When winter arrives and the temperature drops to 7-8, snakes begin to hibernate in caves, tree hollows and rock crevices in high dry areas. During hibernation, there are often dozens or hundreds of snakes of the same or different species in clusters. Why do snakes hibernate en masse?

Because snakes are cold-blooded animals, the temperature in their body varies with the temperature of their environment. In winter, when the outside temperature drops, so does the snake's body temperature. Therefore, snakes adopt hibernation to adapt to the low temperature.

During this period, the snake does not eat or move, and only relies on the consumption of the fat stored in the body before wintering to maintain the minimum needs of life activities. In such a harsh natural environment as winter, the mortality rate of snakes that live in scattered hibernation is as high as 1 3 to 1 2. If you hibernate in groups, you can increase the ambient temperature by 1-2 and reduce water loss.

This greatly reduces the level of energy expenditure in the body, reduces mortality, and also helps to increase the chances of male and female snakes mating after the sting in the following spring. Every year in April and May, after the snake stings, it begins to come out of the burrow, the first task is to find a mate to mate, the female snake's ** and the glands at the base of the tail can secrete a unique strong smell to attract the male snake to follow. Snakes are mostly oviparous, and a few are ovoviviparous.

From the beginning of summer to the beginning of winter, snakes feed and reproduce, and the three months of the year are the busiest time for snakes to feed, and the prey is very wide, including all kinds of vertebrates. Snakes don't chew when they eat, they just swallow their food. The snake's mouth can open wide and swallow food much larger than itself.

In the process of life, snakes also have the phenomenon of molting, and they have to shed their skin several times a year. The peel of the molten skin is called on traditional Chinese medicine"Snake molt"or"Longyi"It has the effect of dispelling rheumatism. There are more than 2 700 species of snakes in the world, of which 1 4 are venomous snakes.

The largest snake is the anaconda, which lives in South America and can reach more than 11 meters in length.

Snakes, one of the cold-blooded animals, do not have sweat glands of their own and cannot regulate their body temperature like other animals, and their body temperature varies with the temperature of the habitat environment. When the external environmental temperature decreases, the metabolic ability of the snake will decrease rapidly, and the amount of activity will also decrease significantly. When the temperature drops significantly, the snake will not eat or drink, and even be in a comatose state, and enter a sleep, that is, hibernation.

Snakes spend the cold and long winter in the form of hibernation, which is an instinctive natural genetic phenomenon inherited from snakes that have been fighting against harsh environmental climates for a long time, and are a dual manifestation of snakes fighting against nature or super vitality.

The reasons why snakes hibernate are as follows.

1 Snakes are relatively inferior terrestrial animals, their tissue structure and functions are primitive, and the blood and ** have no heat preservation function.

2 When the temperature of the external environment decreases, its body temperature also decreases, due to the decrease in body temperature, the activity of enzymes in the body decreases, the speed of biochemical reactions slows down significantly, the sensitivity of the snake to external reactions decreases, when the reaction speed decreases to a certain extent, the snake can not move normally and enters a state of paralysis.

3 When the temperature continues to drop, the snake will freeze to death. In order to adapt to the natural environment, snakes look for dry caves, tree cavities or rock crevices to hibernate when the temperature of the natural environment drops, so hibernation is a way for snakes to survive the severe cold.

The reason for snake hibernation is that snakes are ectotherms, also known as cold-blooded animals, blood and ** have no heat preservation function, and the internal temperature changes with the change of environmental temperature. In winter, as the temperature gradually drops, the body temperature of the snake also drops, and the function of the body also decreases. Snakes go into hibernation and in this way adapt to the cold environment.

Secondly, the food is reduced in winter, during which the snake does not eat or move, and only relies on the energy stored in the body to maintain the minimum needs of life activities to prevent frostbite or starvation, so the snake hibernation mainly plays a role in self-protection.

Snakes are a group of animals belonging to the phylum Chordates, the class Reptiles. The body is elongated, divided into three parts: head, trunk and tail, without limbs or claw-like hind limbs on both sides of the cloaca transversely lobed by lower snakes; The shape of the head varies; Protective transparency outside the eyeball**, pupils round, vertically oval or horizontal, no active eyelids, lenses almost spherical; tongue elongated and bifurcated; The premaxilla (only python snakes have teeth), maxilla, palatine, pterygoid and tooth bones are attached with teeth with back-curved tooth apex, but the size, number and structure of the teeth vary from snake species to species. The tail is significantly shorter than the head body length.

The snake is an ectothermic animal. Its body temperature often changes with the change of temperature in the four seasons, and the metabolic rate and activity in the body are also closely related to the change of body temperature. When the body temperature is high, the metabolic rate is high and the activity is frequent; When body temperature is low, the metabolic rate is low and activity is weakened.

Generally speaking, from late spring to early winter, it is the best season for snake activities, especially in the hot summer and the golden autumn, snake activities are the most active, often wandering around, looking for food day and night, as the saying goes"Seven horizontal, eight hanging, nine entanglement trees"This is a vivid illustration of the fact that these three months are the peak of snake activity. However, there is a limit to how snakes like heat, especially in the scorching heat of summer, and they like to live in shade such as trees, grass, and streams. From autumn to winter, as the temperature gradually drops, the metabolism in the snake's body decreases, and when its physiological activities slow down to a certain level, it gradually enters"Hibernation"Time limit.

Ordinary venomous snakes have begun to hibernate in burrows one after another without eating, drinking, molting or molting since late November, when they often gather in dozens or even hundreds of clusters in burrows or tree cavities located in high dry places for the winter.

This is a physiological problem of the snake, which is natural, and it hibernates to ward off the cold of winter.

Because there is no food in winter, he chooses to hibernate, and if there is a lot of food in winter, he will not hibernate.

The main reason why snakes and other animals hibernate is that it is difficult to find suitable food for them in winter, and snakes are cold-blooded animals, and it is difficult for them to survive due to the low temperature in winter, so they choose to hibernate.

Snakes are cold-blooded animals, and the temperature in their body varies with the temperature of their environment. In winter, when the outside temperature drops, so does the snake's body temperature. Therefore, snakes adopt hibernation to adapt to the low temperature.

The reason why snakes hibernate is because the weather is cold in winter, which is not suitable for survival, so they should hibernate.

Snake hibernation is the inevitable result of thousands of years of natural selection by species in the process of biological evolution.

It is conceivable that if the snake cannot hibernate, then its metabolism will not decline in winter, and most of the animals it hunts will either freeze to death or hide and hibernate. In this way, the snake will starve to death because it cannot find food.

Because snakes are afraid of the cold, they need to find a place to conserve their physical strength, and they need to maintain their physical strength through hibernation.

The snake is a cold-blooded animal, and in the winter his blood does not flow, freeze into a stick and go into hibernation, and when the temperature slowly rises, its body temperature recovers. will wake up from hibernation.

Snakes need to hibernate because of their habits, such as bears, which also need to hibernat, while some animals like dogs and cats do not.

Because the snake is an ectothermic animal, its body temperature will change with the temperature of the surrounding environment, if the snake does not hibernate, then the snake's body temperature will also be below 0 degrees below 0 degrees, and it will freeze at this time.

The reasons why snakes hibernate are as follows.

1. Snakes are relatively low-grade terrestrial animals, and their organizational structure and functions are primitive, and their blood and ** have no thermal insulation function.

2. When the temperature of the external environment decreases, its body temperature also decreases, due to the decrease in body temperature, the activity of enzymes in the body decreases, the speed of biochemical reactions slows down significantly, the sensitivity of the snake to external reactions decreases, when the reaction speed decreases to a certain extent, the snake can not move normally and enters a state of paralysis.

3 When the temperature continues to drop, the snake will freeze to death. In order to adapt to the natural environment, snakes look for dry and sunny caves, tree cavities or rock crevices to hibernate when the temperature of the natural environment drops, so hibernation is a way for snakes to survive the severe cold.

The body temperature of three animals, fish, frogs, and snakes, varies according to the seasons. If it's summer, their body temperature is 25 degrees, and by noon, it drops to 40 degrees. In winter, when the temperature drops below freezing, they go into hibernation and their body temperature drops below freezing.

Fish, frogs, snakes are known as cold-blooded animals, and their body temperature changes with the temperature. These animals do not have a mechanism to regulate their body temperature, and only rely on their own behavior to regulate the emission of body heat or absorb heat from the external environment to increase their own body temperature.

When the temperature of the external environment increases, the metabolic rate of the animals increases, and so does the body temperature. Conversely, when the ambient temperature decreases, their body temperature drops, and their metabolic rate decreases. Cold-blooded animals are also known as ectotherms, and in addition to fish, frogs, and snakes, there are many mammals that are ectotherms.

Snakes and frogs go into hibernation in winter, they don't eat all winter, because the outside environment is too cold, they are afraid of the cold environment, so they have been hiding in the warm environment and dare not come out. Usually in winter, frogs and snakes are not seen. Fish do not hibernate and are resistant to frost, but the temperature should not be too low, and if the temperature is too low, they will freeze to death.