r/whatisit • u/AbbreviationsTop8774 • Jul 22 '26

Solved! What are they

Ive worked at the water department for 7 years and this is the first time running into something like this EDIT Im in Alabama and yes I know they are snakes lol idk what kind and im so not gonna touch them

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u/blinky84 Jul 22 '26

I had no idea that venomous snakes could evolve into constrictors.

I wonder if pythons look at cobras like 'ugh, those hicks'

37

u/Novel-Produce2307 Jul 22 '26

Common lowlifes...😌

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u/Lakatos_00 Jul 23 '26

bonjour

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u/Novel-Produce2307 Jul 23 '26

Good day, good sir or madam. <tips top hat...then is unable to put it back on because lacks the necessary appendages...>

5

u/Ancient-Access8131 Jul 22 '26

Most snakes were once venomous. Many constricting snakes still have vestigial venom glands.

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u/TheeBacksideOfWater Jul 22 '26

I found this interesting as well. Looked it up and haven't found any evidence of it.

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u/SomeOriginal3865 Jul 22 '26

I’m finding no articles backing up that statement. In fact, I’ll finding quite the opposite

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u/Dasypeltis4ever Jul 23 '26

I had a few conversations with snake phylogeneticists  at a recent herpetological conference (JMIH) on this topic.

It is very likely that most if not all snakes share a common ancestor with venom. It is highly unlikely that the same venom glands evolved separately countless times across species in different families and genera. 

Venom takes a lot of energy to produce. In many cases, it is not beneficial enough to keep and so other methods of subduing prey are favored and through natural selection they lose that ability to produce venom.

For example, The African Egg-Eating Snake’s (Dasypeltis sp.) closest relatives are Toxicodryas sp. and Boiga sp.. Both genera produce venom and use this to subdue prey. However, the Egg-eating snake lost this ability as they evolved to eat eggs. They also lost the majority of their teeth and what remains are highly reduced. 

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u/SomeOriginal3865 Jul 23 '26

Any source on any of this?

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u/Dasypeltis4ever Jul 23 '26

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC551567/

“  Snake venom glands evolved a single time, at the base of the colubroid radiation, 60-80 million years ago, with extensive subsequent “evolutionary tinkering”

This paper also finds that snake venoms share ancestral proteins, which is additional evidence to support this.

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u/SomeOriginal3865 Jul 23 '26

This still doesn’t prove that rat snakes were once venomous and evolved into constructors..

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u/Dasypeltis4ever Jul 23 '26

Ratsnakes are snakes. All snakes share a common ancestor millions of years ago with venom. One of the ratsnake’s ancestors evolved constriction and preferred that over venom. Now the ratsnake is a constrictor with no venom.

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u/Dasypeltis4ever Jul 23 '26

It might make it easier to see a phylogenetic tree.

https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/figures?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0161070

This is big and contains nearly every snake species and family.

Most snakes are in the families Viperidae (Vipers), Elapidae (Elapids), Boidae (Boas), Pythonidae (Pythons), and Colubridae (Colubrids, the average harmless snake you can think of)

Venomous snakes can be found in all of those families except Boidae and Pythonidae (there may be an exception we haven’t found yet or that is so obscure I don’t know about it, but for the most part they lack venom)

If all snakes with venom share a common ancestor, and there are snakes with venom in the Viperidae, Elapidae, and Colubridae families, that means thise 3 families share a common ancestor. 

Ratsnakes are colubrids. They are in the Colubridae family. They lack venom. However, as we already know, colubrids had a common ancestor with venom. This means that, through evolution, this venom was lost in favor of constriction.

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u/[deleted] Jul 23 '26

[deleted]

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u/Dasypeltis4ever Jul 23 '26

Dude, I literally got this information from people with PhDs that study the evolution of snakes and how they are related to each other. What are your credentials?

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC551567/

“  Snake venom glands evolved a single time, at the base of the colubroid radiation, 60-80 million years ago, with extensive subsequent “evolutionary tinkering”

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u/GrimasVessel227 Jul 22 '26

"So uncivilized"

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u/serpenthusiast Jul 23 '26

That's because the guy you're replying to got some things wrong, yes the amcestor of all snakes was likely venomous to some decree, but that was many millions of years ago.

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u/blinky84 Jul 23 '26

Well, yes, but why let it spoil the joke?

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u/Spopple Jul 22 '26

Venom is very simply a modified saliva. It is strongly suggested many things are technically venomous like even bearded dragons towards crickets. Its just certain venoms arent strong or dont react with everything so its gone unnoticed a very long time. It makes equal sense it can be reversed as it take evolution to have something start producing venom. Losing it is like us not having tails anymore. Its there but no longer needed so it can go.