image credit wikifaunia.com
Did you know that the Calabar Ground Boa (Charina reinhardtii) is pretty famous for its defensive behavior because of its extraordinary blunt head and equally blunt tail that are hard to tell apart? When threatened, it rolls into a tight ball with its head safely protected in the center of the coils and raises its tail as a false head in order to protect its real head (as shown on above image).
The Calabar Ground Boa can reach a maximum length of approximately 80 – 100 cm. Its scales are black or dark brown, scattered with red or orange. The tail may be ringed or have a partial ring of bright white scales. The Boas small mouth is not suited to large prey, thus it hunts on small mammals, often invading their tunnels and nests. It may wait for the adults to leave the nest, after which it will enter to eat whole litters at a time.
Calabar Boas are a burrowing species, and hardly ever come above ground during daylight hours. On the other hand, they can be extremely active at night, and under a red night lamp can be a very fascinating species to observe….
7 comments:
Hi, I voted for your blog. I love animals. too, but not snakes, though.
I love snakes. We have a rat/corn snake in our living room (but he spends most of the time hidden from view in his vis). I've even got one tattooed on my arm (it's my Chinese zodiac symbol). But I haven't come across this snake before.
Nice post. I'll be back to check out some of your other posts later. ;-)
cyberpunk65.blogspot.com
Hi Mara,
I'm happy to know that you love animals :) I find snakes extraordinary creatures even though I am a bit afraid of them :))
Hi there Cyberpunk65,
After reading your comment I went sifting through the internet to see what a rat/com snake was.
WOW...It is incredibly beautiful. What color is your snake? I found the green rat snake very beautiful!
I also like tattoos very much - I did a post some time ago on "beautiful animal tattoos" :)
Eddy's a creamy grey and fawn brown mottled rat/corn snake. My wife's sister and husband bought him us as a anniversary present a few years ago. He was pencil thin and sized. Now he's between 1.5 to 2 inches thick and over 3foot long. He spend most of the time under his newspaper and attacks the glass front when he's hungry. My wife's had snakes before and used to handling them, but he's bit her when he was a pencil and now she doesn't trust him to handle him much. He is a beautiful specimen though.
We tend to love all animals. We have a African Grey parrot called Charlie. Three cats: Puss, Thomas and Ky. A dog, Gismo, whose got too shorter legs and a normal head and body which gives him a cartoon feel. And 2 shubunkin goldfish. All in ours is a slightly mad house lol.
Eddy's a creamy grey and fawn brown mottled rat/corn snake. My wife's sister and husband bought him us as a anniversary present a few years ago. He was pencil thin and sized. Now he's between 1.5 to 2 inches thick and over 3foot long. He spend most of the time under his newspaper and attacks the glass front when he's hungry. My wife's had snakes before and used to handling them, but he's bit her when he was a pencil and now she doesn't trust him to handle him much. He is a beautiful specimen though.
We tend to love all animals. We have a African Grey parrot called Charlie. Three cats: Puss, Thomas and Ky. A dog, Gismo, whose got too shorter legs and a normal head and body which gives him a cartoon feel. And 2 shubunkin goldfish. All in ours is a slightly mad house lol.
Hello Cyberpunk65,
What a lovely snake :)
I see you have lots of pets - that's so nice. Your dog is out of the ordinary - the more different the animals the more I admire them!
I also have quite a few animals. 4 cats (pantufa / greeny / vadia / filha-gata)- oldest is 13 years old, she was operated in June (tumor removed). 2 dogs (rex and spotty). and 1 tortoise (ninja)
(photos of my cats are on the blog)
It's so nice to have animals around us!
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