Tuesday, May 09, 2006
Living in the Middle of Nowhere isn't so bad part IV
On sunday I engaged in another Central Canada adventure--the emergence of the red-sided garter snakes. The red sided garters, (Thamnophis sirtalis parietalis), one of 7 distinct subspecies of the common garter snake, would not normally be able to live this far north, but central manitoba has a porous limestone geology which creates a system of underground cracks and caves. the snakes enter the caves (called dens or "hiburnacula") and are able to get down below the frost line to overwinter in large groups. The approximatley 70,000 snakes emerge en masse in April and May to breed at the den openings. garter breeding involves one female surrounded by, potentially, hundreds of males in a "mating ball" which looks like a huge pile of writhing snakes http://www.canadacool.com/COOLFACTS/MANITOBA/Snakes.html. It is insanely cool. After mating the snakes slither off as far as 30km to spend the summer eating frogs and baby mice until thier oviviparous* eggs hatch. They then return to the dens to overwinter. There is actually a Wildlife Management Area (a kind of provincial park) in Narcisse, MB (pronounced NAR-siss) to protect 4 of the dens http://www.mts.net/~nwilliam/Narcise.html. There were upwards of 100 cars in the parking lot and even a mobile mini-donut vendor. It was like a rock concert for snakes.
*ovivipary is a life history strategy where the mother retains the fertilized, non-placental eggs within her body cavity until hatch. They young then emerge live. Sharks are also oviviparous. The strategy is often adopted when there are no suitable habitats or not enough environmental stability to allow extenal eggs deposition.
# posted by 8yearoldsdude @ 3:31 PM 
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I stand by my earlier comment that the snakes sound gross. The NYTimes has an article today on bad animal mothers that talks about baby sharks living inside the mother (who apparently has 2 wombs)-- ovivipary?? It turns out she has multiple babies in each womb, but they eat each other and only 1 emerges alive from each womb. Interesting, but gross. --EWK
# posted by 
: 8:48 PM
: 8:48 PM
Does it get any better than snake porn?
Apparently the reason that cats' litters can have kittens that look nothing alike is due to the fact that while they were all birthed at the same time, they had different, ah, sperm donors.
Apparently the reason that cats' litters can have kittens that look nothing alike is due to the fact that while they were all birthed at the same time, they had different, ah, sperm donors.
My knowledge of snakes, sharks and cats has recently tripled, thanks to this post. Now I am interested in finding a species that engages in the mating ball, but with one male surrounded by hundereds of females...and then I want to join that species for a post-winter engagement.
I remember seeing a video of this, and all I can say is that if you didn't think a snake could look terrified, you haven't seen a female red-sideds chased by hundreds of males over rocks, brush, and whatever else gets in her way.
Crazy! Having grown up in Buffalo, and now living in Wisconsin, I feel as if I haven't been exposed to as much cool nature stuff as people who grew up in some more ecologically interesting locals. Here, its pretty much wide open plains, with no animals any more interesting than the occasional mouse or deer.
The sand counties of west central wisconsin are one of the coolest natural areas around, memorialized in aldo leopold's "A sand county almanac."
I'm looking around for a good Snakes on a Plane joke here, but nothing I've come up with is quite worthy of print.
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