A different way of hunting
A hungry rattlesnake glides through the grass at night. The animals it
hunts can’t see it well in the dark. The snake can’t see them either,
but it doesn’t have to. It has another way of finding them.
On the rattlesnake’s head, just below its eyes, are two openings called
pits. These pits can feel the warmth of another animal’s body—even
though the animal is not very near.
Suddenly, the snake turns to the left. A rat is nearby and the
rattlesnake’s pits have felt the heat of the rat’s warm body. Silently
the snake moves closer. Then it shoots its head forward and catches the
rat in its mouth. The snake’s pits guided the snake right to where the
rat was!
Below each eye on a rattlesnake’s head is a hole called a pit.
The rattlesnake’s pits help it find the animals it eats.
Banded Rattlesnake and Wood Rat
Female Mosquito
On a female mosquito’s round, knoblike head are two feelers that help
her find her food.
A female mosquito can feel warmth a long way off, too. She feels heat
with her two wiggly feelers. The blood of warm animals is a female
mosquito’s food. When a mosquito comes onto your arm, her feelers have
told her you were warm—and she wants to eat!
We know what it’s like for an animal to hunt by seeing, hearing, and
smelling. But what would it be like to hunt by feeling an animal’s
warmth a long way off, as rattlesnakes and mosquitoes do? That’s part of
the world of animals that we can only imagine.
