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SNAKES BATTLE TO DEATH
FOR SCIENCE
By H A R R Y DUNN
STAGING real battles between
poisonous a n d nonpoisonous
snakes of the United States has
become one of the leading
occupations of the staff of the
Department of Clinical Medicine of
Tulane University in New Orleans.
These battles between "sluggers" and
"wrestlers" of the reptile world—for all
poisonous snakes kill by striking and all
their nonpoisonous relatives by constriction—have
been the center of interest
for Louisiana scientists, students, and
physicians during the last summer, and
will be continued for some time to come.
From these battles the experimenters
are learning, in the first place, just what
harmless snakes are inimical to the poisonous
members of the family, and thus
should be encouraged on the farms of
the South, where the death toll by snake
bite is heavy each year. Next they are
practically convinced, from their experiments
that the poison of the water moccasin,
which is responsible for most of
the deaths from snake-bite in Louisiana,
and of the rattler and the coral snake
has no bad effect on the nonpoisonous
king snake, the "gopher" snake, or the
black snake, all of which have been
found to be consistent enemies of the
poisonous varieties.
It would appear, also, from these experiments,
that the nonpoisonous snake,
once he is fanged by a poisonous snake,
sheds his skin within a few hours. This
is interesting, as it may be shown to have
an intimate connection with the apparent
immunity of the harmless varieties.
The latest and most interesting contest
was arranged by Jules Ledieu, the laboratory
technician and assistant. Jules
carefully "trained" a full-grown king
snake, about thirty inches in length, and
a water moccasin nearly four feet long,
for this fray by giving them no food for
a month. Then, on a sunshiny afternoon,
the young scientist picked up the
moccasin with a gentle but firm grip
applied just behind the ears and dropped
him into a net-covered pit in which the
king snake was enjoying the warmth of
the September day.
Immediately the moccasin, which, it
should be said, is better known to Jules
as agkistrodon piscivorus, crawled over
to the king snake, wdiich Jules calls lampropeltis
sayi, and, without waiting for
the formality of coiling, as poisonous
snakes always have been supposed to do
before they strike, fanged the king just
where better formed creatures have their
necks.
The king, it appears, was in contented
mood, though unfed, and wriggled off to
the other side of the pit. There the moccasin
followed and again pricked his remote
relative with his fangs.
This was too much ; the king threw
himself into a coil, and the killer from the
swamps immediately took up his favorite
fighting attitude, his body looped like the
letter O. his head drawn back within the
coil, ready to strike. The king feinted
as a boxer at one side of the mudcolored
body, and the moccasin struck at
him. This was wdiat the king wanted,
and before his enemy could withdraw his
armed head to striking position, the little
constrictor had him by the lower jaw,
and had leaped from his coil to wind
about the writhing body of the moccasin.
The backward-slanting teeth of the
king sank slowly into the moccasin's jaw
until the poison-bearing fangs were
powerless to strike, and the whip-like,
gray-green body of the smaller snake began
to draw tight around the intruder.
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