Animal facts for kids

The snake charmer wanders into the village, finds a place where people gather and sets his basket or pot in front of him.

Then he begins playing his wooden flute and swaying to the music. As spectators gather, he removes the lid of his container and slowly a snake rises up to face him, spreading its neck into a flat hood.

The deadly brown cobra begins swaying, apparently keeping time to the music. Then, after the performance, the charmer puts the lid back on the container and collects money from his audience.

It is a dangerous occupation being a snake charmer — not something we’d recommend you try at home, as they say — but as in other forms of entertainment, things are not always as they seem.

For example, though it appears the cobra is swaying to the music, it isn’t. This is because cobras don’t have ears and can’t hear, though they can sense vibrations coming through the ground. What is really happening is the cobra is matching the movements of the charmer. And often it isn’t quite as dangerous as it appears because the charmer has broken off the cobra’s fangs or has even sewn its mouth shut.

Nevertheless, in order to break off a cobra’s fangs or sew its mouth shut, you have to catch a cobra, which is not a job for the fainthearted.

Cobras belong to a family of poisonous snakes called “elapidae,” members of which are found everywhere but Europe. In North America, coral snakes, mambas and sea snakes are members of that family.

There are six types of true cobras, five of which are found in Africa and one in Asia.

Some notable cobras are the forest cobra of Africa, which grows to nine feet and can raise its head six feet off the ground, and the “spitting” (or more accurately, “spraying”) variety, which can blind a lion at 10 feet.

However, most widely known are the Asian variety, which have been made famous by snake charmers, and through such stories as Rudyard Kipling’s “Rikki-Tikki-Tavi” (about a brave mongoose who fights a cobra), and because of their role in Hinduism. (Some Hindus believe cobras are the god Shiva in the flesh, and encourage them to live near temples to that god.)

Fortunately, cobras don’t regard humans as lunch (we are too big for them to swallow whole and they don’t have teeth to make us smaller), so they generally avoid contact with people, and instead focus their appetites on rats, mice, birds, bird eggs, lizards, frogs, small fish, and even other cobras.

A snake is a backboned animal with a long, legless body covered by dry scales. Snakes have unusual body features and fascinating ways of life. To move about on land, a snake usually slides on its belly. Many snakes have such a flexible body that they can coil into a ball. The eyes of a snake are covered by clear scales instead of movable eyelids. As a result, its eyes are always open. Snakes have a narrow, forked tongue, which they repeatedly flick out. They use the tongue to bring odors to a special sense organ in the mouth, allowing them to follow the scent trails of their prey.

Snakes are one of four orders in the class Reptilia (along with the lizards, turtles and tortoises, and crocodilians). Like other reptiles, snakes can maintain a steady body temperature by external means. For example, they can raise their body temperature by lying in the sun. In contrast, most other animals have internal mechanisms that regulate their body temperature.

Snakes developed gradually from lizards millions of years ago, and they resemble lizards more than they do other reptiles. But unlike most lizards, snakes lack legs, movable eyelids, and outer ears. Their scales and skulls also differ from those of lizards.

Snakes live almost everywhere on the earth. They are found in deserts, forests, oceans, streams, and lakes. Many are ground dwellers, and some live underground. Others dwell in trees, and still others spend most of their time in water. Only a few areas of the world have no snakes. Because snakes cannot survive where the ground stays frozen the year around, no snakes are found in the polar regions or at high elevations in mountains. In addition, no snakes are found in Ireland or New Zealand.

There are about 2700 kinds of snakes. The greatest variety dwell in the tropics. The largest snakes are the anacondas of South America and the reticulate python of Asia, both of which can grow to lengths of 30 feet. One of the smallest snakes is the Braminy blind snake, which lives in the tropics and grows only 6 inches long.

Some snakes are poisonous. They have two hollow or grooved fangs in the upper jaw, through which they inject venom into their victims. About 270 kinds of snakes have venom that is harmful or fatal to humans.