Feeding day for a large hungry anaconda.
Anacondas are truly giant snakes.
Video taken on June 9, 2017 of a large Anaconda eating a feeder pig.
The green anaconda (Eunectes murinus) is the largest snake in the world by weight, and the second longest.
Animation in video shows a snake's lower jaw is not joined by an elastic ligament at the front (chin) that allows the two halves to spread apart, connected in front by an elastic ligament. Each half of lower jaw moves independently.
Quadrate bones at the back of snake's skulls at attachment points to lower jaws, are not rigidly attached. They pivot allowing vertical and horizontal rotation. This allows ingestion of large prey such as this pig.
Video for online degree programs, bachelor degree accreditation, and biostatistics for reptile feeding behavior; and degrees in zoology.
Shows the pterygoid walk of snake's jaws. Quadrate bones at back of snake's skulls at attachment points to lower jaws are not rigidly attached. They pivot allowing vertical and horizontal rotation. This allows ingestion of large prey such as this pig.
This video focuses on the science of snake behavior to support a master's thesis. Video is for citation for junior high school, high school science reports.
Super-sized meals such as this pig do not intimidate snakes. Unlike a mammalian jaw which is built for brute chewing or biting force -- as you can see in this video -- a snake's jaws are connected with tendons and ligaments that gives it a gymnast's flexibility.
Jaws of snakes do not dislocate. One of the enduring myths of snake feeding mechanisms is that the jaws detach. They stay connected all the time. As seen in the video, the two lower jaws move independently of one another. The quadrate bone is not rigidly attached to the skull, but articulates with the skull at one end and is therefore free moving.
Video shows the “transport cycle” to get the pig into the python's belly. Called a pterygoid walk, the python opens its jaw and alternately ratchets its upper jaw over the surface of the meal, in turn “walking” its mouth over and around the prey.
Filmed with the University of Guadalajara for Biological and Agricultural Sciences, the division of Biological and Environmental Science Division, at the department of Botany and Zoology.