How do snakes reproduce?
Me and my partner are wondering how do snakes reproduce and when they reproduce? We are fascinated and have no idea how they create young little baby snakes if the sperm and the egg do not meet or even how it happens
Me and my partner are wondering how do snakes reproduce and when they reproduce? We are fascinated and have no idea how they create young little baby snakes if the sperm and the egg do not meet or even how it happens
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Snakes reproduce sexually, using internal fertilisation. Like all reptiles, they have a cloaca - a single opening used to excrete, mate and lay eggs/give birth. Males have two penises, which are out of sight inside the cloaca until needed for mating. It was once thought that the two had to join together to form a channel down which the sperm could travel, and for this reason they are often called hemipenes, even though we now know that each is a separate structure that functions on its own. Only one is used at a time, and the male may alternate which he uses with each mating. It is inserted into the female's cloaca and deposits sperm inside her, fertilising her eggs. In some snakes, the eggs are then coated in shell and laid, and hatch after an incubation period (most snakes simply lay their eggs somewhere safe and leave them to develop on their own, but pythons brood their eggs, coiling around them and twitching their muscles to generate heat). Other snakes, such as boas and most vipers, give birth to live young.
There is also one species, the Brahminy blind snake or 'flowerpot snake', which is parthenogenetic. This means that the entire population is female - there are no males, and each female can produce young by herself.
So, there are 2 sexes, the female snake and the male
snake. Both sexes are needed for reproduction, and their
bodies are a little different, so they have organs
apropriate for females and for males in order for them
to reproduce.
Nature is very perfect, when it is
the adequate time for reproduction there are an inside
urgent call for the male to look for a female and also
for the female to accept that call. Actually she has
the same urgent call.
Then as in other animal couples
they get very close one to another, and they hug
themselves very tightly so the male is able to drop
his "seeds" (that are called sperm ) inside the female
body. After that, the sperm inside the snake female
gets in contact with her sexual organ, the oviduct,
where there are a collection of eggs.
At that place, when the sperm gets in contact with the eggs, and goes
inside it, the baby snakes begin to be formed.
After some time, the babies are ready to be born.
Depending upon each species there are some that
are born "alive" that is the little snake itself ,
and they are called viviparous.
Other species have their babies delivered inside
eggs like the chicken do. They are called oviparous.
The eggs must hatch for the little snakes to be
born , that is to live. Both the viviparous and the oviparous snakes have
an opening in the body called cloaca. It is through
the cloaca that the female snakes expel both the eggs and
the babies already alive.
After copulation, the eggs inside the abdomen of female snake become fertilized. Having a yellow, yolk,and egg shell. Later they will be laid in a hole in the ground buried and stay for three weeks to hatch baby snakes under favorable conditions. The baby snakes are completely self dependent.