A small snake that lives only on a pinprick of an island in the Caribbean has won the title of world's rarest snake, a dubious honor for the St. Lucia racer. As few as 18 of its kind remain on Earth, making it one of the planet's rarest animals overall.
Described as gentle and easy to handle, the remaining snakes live on a half-mile-square island just offshore of St. Lucia, one of the Lesser Antilles, a chain of small volcanic islands that stretches from Puerto Rico to South America, dividing the Caribbean from the Atlantic Ocean.
The mottled brown snakes, once abundant on St. Lucia, were decimated by the arrival of mongooses — fierce reptile hunters — in the late 19th century. The small, furry carnivores were brought in from India to control venomous snakes on the island, but the mongooses, fearless predators, didn't discriminate. By 1936, the St. Lucia racer, a harmless species that grows to just under 3 feet (1 meter) in length, was declared extinct.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment
You only need to enter your comment once! Comments will appear once they have been moderated. This is so as to stop the would-be comedian who has been spamming the comments here with inane and often offensive remarks. You know who you are!