Snake 'Eyes'

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 66, 19 March 1938, Page 3 (Supplement)

Snake 'Eyes'

By ROY CHAPMAN ANDREWS

Director of the American Museum ol Natural History

THE Central Asiatic Expedition was driven out of one of Its most productive camps in the Gobi Desert by a plague of vipers. They swarmed upon us on the first cold night. We killed 47. and still more came. Tliey were pit viper# —allied to our copperhead*. How did they know that we were there —I can't tell —bin a significant fart recently discovered by Dr. (J. K. Noble in his lalioratories at the American Museum of Natural Hi-lory. The New World pit vipers. Crotalidae. include tlio moccasins. rati b*siiak<s and copj>erhcad*. They are di-t iivjui-hed from all other viperid snakes by the ipii. sory pit on each side of the face between the nor-tril and tin* eye. No one knew just what was the function of ti;rv pit-, j Some of the boas haie a series of s'ui sory pits on the scales of the upper ,i"*l j lower jaws. Hr. Nobles experiments |ha\e shown that both types scne *i, detect t lie body temperature of t iie 'snake"* prey. And in the pit lipd- • !ier I al«o indicate air ihu- ]■■<•,iting prey or danger. ! He conducted hi? experiments by eliminating the sen-e ..rail's one at a time and testing wi'li warn and colJ electric j light bull*. When tV- snakes are blind--1 folded thev will inva:-ably distinguish between th- .Id md the slightly warm i bulbs. T":.cv «iii -trike viciously at tb j warm bill'-- at di-tance* >".'»'= e;"ht to )» or 20 inches. ~ "1., the ;-.H.now pit "P<* r5 f? r \ f ? V 1 i , pike from a blindfolded eo" d induce s },l,lbs. indicating snake on moitng com ;h „ „ in the pits respond to air .veil as heat. p ollt „f >o don't think that yon ]ic3<J danger from a rattler or *1 if you approach too " k V(IU . ire ' likely to be disastrous.