May 08 - Red-sided garter snake, Narcisse, Manitoba
Unseasonably cold, wet weather cheated me here at Narcisse. Usually early in the spring countless red-sided garter snakes, one of the world's most unusual reptiles, emerge from their dens in caves in Mantoba's interlake district to mate in writhing masses of thousands. It's a unique spectacle that people from all over the world come to see, like the monarchs in Mexico. www.youtube.com/watch?v=-U27dwh0F8s There were a bunch in one of the pits that day, but nothing like what you see in that video.
- These brumate together (mammals hibernate) in limestone caves at a depth below the frostline but above the watertable where the temperature is 4 degrees in the winter. This is unusual, most snakes are solitary, not social. In the spring the males emerge first and then the females who each attract a group of males who writhe around her while they wrestle with their tales. One successfully mates with her, she receives and stores the sperm in her body and leaves the pits, but the sperm won't have contact with her eggs until after a few weeks or so pass while she gorges on all the food she can catch and eat. Most snakes and most reptiles lay eggs, but this snake gives birth to live young that immediately take off on their own to find whatever they can to eat, grow, and the lucky ones that make it to their first winter find a spot deep in a hole somewhere to brumate alone. In the fall the next year, older snakes release a chemical signal that triggers an instinct (in snakes more than a year old) to follow the leaders back to the dens from within a radius of 20 kms., and mass in 10s of 1000s again deep in the pits for the winter. One mystery is how the older snakes know the route back to the dens. Scientists don't believe that the 'aggregate' signal chemical could preserve on the snake routes for a year, and suspect that the older snakes navigate by landmarks or possibly by the stars (wow!). It's not known how monarchs or migratory birds know their way around as well as they do either.
[Update: It seems that these critters could be taking advantage of quantum physics or mechanics, specifically spooky and controversial 'quantum entanglement', allowing birds to navigate in accordance with the earth's magnetic field. !! Watch from the 2:13 - 11:35 min. pt.s www.youtube.com/watch?v=KhZXJsCKXvc ]
- There's strength in great numbers in a brief period of exposure like this. The snakes are vulnerable in the open and crows and ravens with their nests over the pits and other predators gorge themselves for a few weeks, but with so many snakes, predators can fill up on only a fraction. (It's the same dynamic with cycadas and locusts.) With so much to eat, the birds are only interested in the kidneys and the liver, and you'll see many dead snakes with two holes at specific spots in their underbellies. The rest is left to the bugs.
May 08 - Red-sided garter snake, Narcisse, Manitoba
Unseasonably cold, wet weather cheated me here at Narcisse. Usually early in the spring countless red-sided garter snakes, one of the world's most unusual reptiles, emerge from their dens in caves in Mantoba's interlake district to mate in writhing masses of thousands. It's a unique spectacle that people from all over the world come to see, like the monarchs in Mexico. www.youtube.com/watch?v=-U27dwh0F8s There were a bunch in one of the pits that day, but nothing like what you see in that video.
- These brumate together (mammals hibernate) in limestone caves at a depth below the frostline but above the watertable where the temperature is 4 degrees in the winter. This is unusual, most snakes are solitary, not social. In the spring the males emerge first and then the females who each attract a group of males who writhe around her while they wrestle with their tales. One successfully mates with her, she receives and stores the sperm in her body and leaves the pits, but the sperm won't have contact with her eggs until after a few weeks or so pass while she gorges on all the food she can catch and eat. Most snakes and most reptiles lay eggs, but this snake gives birth to live young that immediately take off on their own to find whatever they can to eat, grow, and the lucky ones that make it to their first winter find a spot deep in a hole somewhere to brumate alone. In the fall the next year, older snakes release a chemical signal that triggers an instinct (in snakes more than a year old) to follow the leaders back to the dens from within a radius of 20 kms., and mass in 10s of 1000s again deep in the pits for the winter. One mystery is how the older snakes know the route back to the dens. Scientists don't believe that the 'aggregate' signal chemical could preserve on the snake routes for a year, and suspect that the older snakes navigate by landmarks or possibly by the stars (wow!). It's not known how monarchs or migratory birds know their way around as well as they do either.
[Update: It seems that these critters could be taking advantage of quantum physics or mechanics, specifically spooky and controversial 'quantum entanglement', allowing birds to navigate in accordance with the earth's magnetic field. !! Watch from the 2:13 - 11:35 min. pt.s www.youtube.com/watch?v=KhZXJsCKXvc ]
- There's strength in great numbers in a brief period of exposure like this. The snakes are vulnerable in the open and crows and ravens with their nests over the pits and other predators gorge themselves for a few weeks, but with so many snakes, predators can fill up on only a fraction. (It's the same dynamic with cycadas and locusts.) With so much to eat, the birds are only interested in the kidneys and the liver, and you'll see many dead snakes with two holes at specific spots in their underbellies. The rest is left to the bugs.