Venomous snakes are snakes which have venom glands and specialized teeth for the injection of venom. Members of the families Elapidae, Viperidae and Atractaspididae (and some from Colubridae as well) are major venomous snakes.
All elapids have a pair of proteroglyphous fangs that are used to inject venom from glands located towards the rear of the upper jaws. In outward appearance terrestrial elapids look similar to the Colubridae: almost all have long and slender bodies with smooth scales, a head that is covered with large shields and not always distinct from the neck, and eyes with round pupils. In addition, their behavior is usually quite active and most are oviparous. There are exceptions to all these generalizations: e.g. the death adders (Acanthophis) include short and fat, rough-scaled, very broad-headed, cat-eyed, live-bearing, sluggish ambush predators with partly fragmented head shields.
No comments:
Post a Comment