Steppe viper. Common viper photo and description The internal structure of the common viper

The common viper (lat. Vipera berus) is a poisonous snake of the Viperidae family (Viperidae) common in Europe and Asia. It is the only reptile in the world that is found even beyond the Arctic Circle.

The species was first described in 1758 by Carl Linnaeus under the name Coluber berus. Currently, 3 subspecies are known. The nominative subspecies is distributed on the European continent.

Common viper bites

This snake, despite its reputation, is a relatively peaceful creature. Although her poison can be deadly to humans, she attacks him only in self-defense. In most cases, she avoids meeting people and always tries to crawl away, even if she was stepped on, of course, not very much.

Often, humanoid misunderstandings, seeing a viper, grab the first drin that comes across and try to kill it with a wild cry. It is absolutely impossible to do this. If there is nowhere to run, and the bipedal primate is extremely aggressive, then the snake first emits a warning hiss, and then rushes to the attack, injecting an increased portion of poison into the aggressor.

Usually, an accidental bite from a common viper is shallow and does not pose a particular danger. At the bite site, only pain and severe swelling appear, which disappears in 2-3 days.

Problems arise if the bitten suffers from allergies or diseases of the cardiovascular system, including after heavy drinking. In any case, in case of a bite, you should urgently consult a doctor, and not try to be treated on your own.

It is not the skin damage itself that is dangerous, but the possible non-standard reactions of the body to it. Those who wish to be guaranteed to die from the poison of an ordinary viper must provoke a simultaneous attack by at least 5 reptiles.

Spreading

The reptile lives throughout Europe except for the extreme south, as well as in North Asia, Siberia and Far East down to the coast Pacific Ocean. It is very unpretentious, so it feels comfortable in a variety of biotopes.

In the forest-steppe zone of Ukraine and Russia, representatives of this species often coexist with (Vipera nikolski), which was previously considered to be its black morph.

He prefers to settle where you can always find sunny places and the shade he needs, as well as many secluded corners.

The snake can occupy fairly large hunting areas, diligently bypassing the fields, gardens and vineyards, where it can meet a person. But she lives with pleasure in abandoned houses and for some reason loves the railroad embankments overgrown with grass.

In highlands it can live at altitudes up to 3000 m above sea level.

Behavior

The common viper is diurnal. It is attracted primarily by areas with a cool microclimate, high humidity and significant daily temperature fluctuations. She spends her nights hiding under rocks or under the roots of shrubs and trees.

Sometimes it settles in burrows abandoned by small animals with an entrance sheltered from the wind. The burrow, as a rule, is located on the southern and sunny side of the hillock.

The reptile spends the winter in deep hibernation, which northern regions can last up to 8 months.

Shelters for wintering snakes are looking for in October. Often in one place there can be several dozen copies that are woven into one huge ball. They wake up from hibernation in early spring. First, they bask in the sun for several hours, and only then they go to fish.

Vipers hunt mainly from ambush. Their victims are small warm-blooded animals, birds, lizards and frogs. Most often, small rodents get to them for lunch.

A predator waiting for its prey constantly throws out a long forked tongue from its mouth, which serves as a sensitive organ of smell. With his help, she carries tiny particles odorous substance into the Jacobs organ, which is a chemical analyzer of odors and is located in the upper palate.

Having sensed the prey, the viper instantly attacks it, injects a portion of the poison and immediately opens its jaws.

The bitten animal runs away, but soon drops dead. The snake finds its runaway victim in a few minutes by smell and swallows it whole.

reproduction

The mating season takes place in April-May. At this time, the males are desperately fighting among themselves, intertwining their bodies and trying to press the head of the enemy to the ground.

The fight is somewhat reminiscent of a kind of dance and lasts until one of the males leaves the battlefield.

Fertilized eggs develop in the mother's body within 3 months. A pregnant female observes a strict fast and basks in the sun for a long time to provide the embryos with the necessary conditions for development. In August-September, she lays from 5 to 18 eggs, from which the cubs hatch immediately.

Young snakes are quite independent and can immediately start hunting. They are born 15-18 cm long with well-developed venom glands, so it is undesirable to pick them up and stroke them.

The female brings offspring once every 2-3 years. She uses the long break between births to replenish her stock. nutrients and restoration of forces of the exhausted organism. Vipers molt every 1.5-2 months.

Description

The body length in adult females is 75-80 cm, and in males 65-70 cm. The body is dense and muscular. Adults weigh from 100 to 200 g, and pregnant individuals about 300 g.

Coloring can be gray, brown and black. A dark zigzag stripe stretches along the ridge. There are a number of dark spots on the sides. The entire back is covered with narrow convex scales.

The triangular or heart-shaped head is delimited from the body by a pronounced cervical interception. At the junction of the head and neck there is a dark spot in the form of the Latin letter V or less often in the form of the letter X. The pupils are vertical. The iris is red or reddish brown.

The tail is spindle-shaped, thick and long. Males are usually colored a little brighter. The base of their tail is wider than that of females, in which the tail is shorter and gradually tapers towards the tip.

The life span of the common viper natural conditions about 12 years old.

Species: Vipera berus = Common viper (development and behavior of young vipers)

I should note that the viper is born evil and remains evil for the rest of its life. Little vipers, just hatched from their eggs and still wet, hissed and bit angrily when I touched them, but I must admit that not all are born with the same anger, there are always more calm even between the cubs of the same mother. It is especially amusing to watch how little vipers, barely hatched from an egg, who are just beginning to crawl and get acquainted with the light, usually do not forget to open their mouths from time to time, stick out their deadly weapon - poisonous teeth - expand the back of their heads and prepare for a reprehensible craft.

Immediately after birth, they are from 18 to 23 cm long or a little more, and in the middle of the body they have a centimeter of thickness. The head, scutes, scales, teeth, etc., are arranged like in adults, but the whole body is covered with a very thin, transparent and loose skin, which makes the color of the body seem paler. A few minutes or hours after birth, they peel off this skin, just like adults; so shedding is the first important matter their lives. Among the small vipers born to me, I always found only a fifth of the males, however, and among those born in freedom you always meet many more females than males, while among adults the number of females and males is the same. What could be the cause of this phenomenon?

It should also be noted that vipers have no trace parental love, love of cubs to parents and cubs among themselves. Immediately after birth, each little viper goes its own way, not at all requiring the care of the mother, who herself does not pay any attention to the cubs: vipers of the same litter do not show any connection with each other. You always meet small vipers singly, each very well aware of its strength and showing a lot of courage. However, do they already have the deadly poison inherent in adults, at least to a weaker degree? This question deserves careful study. To do this, I took out a cub from the body of a murdered mother, who was supposed to be born five days later, then I pierced his head several times with a needle in the place where the poisonous glands are located, and with this needle I wounded the crossbill, which did not suffer from this at all.

I repeated this experiment with another small viper and with another crossbill and got the same result. Shortly thereafter, I put the mouse into a box containing 16 vipers born to me, which were about six days old. At first, the mouse did not show fear at all, but, running up and down the box, she heard everywhere a quiet, but angry hiss: all the vipers looked at her menacingly and bit her when they could. She tried to avoid danger by running from side to side, but she received ten bites, of which the most severe were in the face and in the left hind leg. Twice it even happened that a small viper so dug into the mouse with its teeth that it dragged it along for some time. I then took the mouse out of the box, it was limping and intensively cleaning its hind leg and muzzle; then she began to weaken, but after that she lived for about an hour and, finally, died. I put another mouse into a box with 24 young vipers, and the same thing happened to him as to the first?.

Other observations confirm what has been said. From the experiments of Kirsch, it turns out that vipers, a few minutes after hatching from an egg, can already injure mortally. Petri made a great contribution to the study of the development of vipers. This observer received an adult viper, which one of his friends wanted to kill with a stick, and inflicted such severe damage on it that the animal did not move for several hours. From the bright eyes of the viper, Petri realized that she was still alive and carried her to a cage with snakes, began to use revitalizing agents, sprinkled fresh well water and poured especially abundantly on the wounded place on her back. The next day, towards noon, he found the snake in its natural position, slightly curled up, and after eight days it became just as cheerful and biting like any other snake. Almost a month after this, the viper gave birth to ten cubs in one day, of which four were dead, and the rest soon died.

The next night, the snake gave birth to another cub, which, like other animals of this species, bit especially angrily and lived with its mother in the same cage, but on December 6 died from exhaustion. But on December 12, to his considerable surprise, Petri again found three cubs in the cage, although dead, but fully developed, which the old viper could give birth only in the last cold days, since one of the cubs was still lying in soft, bloody mucus. Thus, 15 weeks after the first litter, the viper brought three more completely mature cubs. This amazing fact Petri explains quite rightly, by the wound of the mother and such an alleged position of the three eggs that their development should have been suspended until the wound was completely healed ..

Class - reptiles

Detachment - scaly

Family - Viper snakes

Genus/Species - Vipera berus. common viper

Basic data:

DIMENSIONS

Length: females - up to 80 cm, males - up to 60 cm, newborn cubs -16 cm.

BREEDING

Puberty: from 3-4 years old.

Mating period: April May.

Number of cubs: 5-20.

LIFE STYLE

Habits: common vipers (see photo) except for winter and mating season keep alone.

What does it eat: small rodents, lizards, frogs and chicks.

RELATED SPECIES

The following species of viper snakes live in Europe: steppe viper V. ursini, aspis viper V. aspis, snub-nosed viper V. latasti, Armenian viper V. xanthina, viper V. lebentina and nosy viper V. ammodytes.

The common viper belongs to the viper snake family and inhabits most of Europe. It easily adapts to different conditions. The viper lives in sand dunes and mountainous areas, on hills and in forests. Able to survive also in humid and cold climates.

WHAT DOES IT FEED

The common viper spends its entire life in a fairly small area. She knows her own area very well and can easily find prey on it. Near reservoirs, the viper catches frogs, lizards and water rats. However, its main prey are mice, shrews and other small rodents. With the help of a sensitive sense of smell and reacting to fluctuations in the air, the snake is looking for prey on the ground. Also, she preys on birds whose nests are located on the ground. The victim, approaching a convenient distance for attack, the viper attacks with lightning speed and injects poison into it. Often the victim manages to escape, but the snake catches up with her, because after a few minutes the poison begins to act.

The viper swallows its prey whole, starting from the head. Vipers also hunt lizards, among which more often viviparous and spindle. Young individuals feed on insects.

LIFESTYLE

The viper's lifestyle depends on the time of year. In spring and autumn, the reptile basks in the sun with pleasure, and in summer it remains in the shade from morning to evening. It prefers wooded areas, mostly mixed forests. In the mountains, the viper also inhabits shrubs of coniferous trees.

The viper is a nocturnal animal. During the day, she rests in various shelters. High in the mountains it often hunts during the day. An ordinary viper is not very dangerous, it attacks only if a person steps on it or inadvertently grabs it with a hand. At the beginning of winter, snakes hibernate. They spend the winter under rocks, rock ledges, or in the burrows of small mammals. When the air temperature drops, the snake burrows even deeper to shelter from the cold. Often several snakes share the same hiding place together.

BREEDING

During the mating season, males seek the favor of females and arrange fights for the right to mate. Two males stand opposite each other, raising the front of the body, then circle around and kick until one of them manages to pin the opponent to the ground. The winner tries to interest the female and attract her attention. Fertilized eggs, surrounded by a leathery membrane, develop in the body of the female for about 3 months. Shortly before birth, the cubs gnaw through the membrane of the egg while still in the mother's body. Newborn vipers in the amount of 5-20 individuals look like miniature copies of their parents, their length is 9-16 cm. The mass birth of vipers occurs in August.

From the first minute of their birth, they are completely independent, and yet they remain with their mother for several months. The cubs feed on worms and insects. In the northern and central parts of the range, females give birth in a year. By winter, young vipers, along with adults, hide in rotten stumps or under tree roots.

WATCHING THE ASPER

Vipers are found from March to October. In spring and autumn you can watch them take sunbathing. In areas where vipers are found, warning signs were previously hung out saying that in no case should you pick up snakes in your hands. The bite of a viper causes death only in exceptional cases, but always causes vomiting and diarrhea. Young children and people who are weakened are at greatest risk if they are bitten. Especially dangerous is a bite to the head and blood vessels located close to the surface of the skin. The common viper is peaceful and non-aggressive. Seeing that she is being watched, she is always in a hurry to hide or, hiding, lies quietly.

GENERAL PROVISIONS. DESCRIPTION

The viper is a medium-sized snake, 60-80 cm long. It lives in forests among dense thickets. Hunts at night, sleeps in a hiding place during the day or basks in a quiet place. For the winter, it hides in rodent burrows, under stumps and snags. It feeds on small rodents and frogs. Young vipers are born at the end of summer - 5-14 (sometimes 18) each, 10-15 cm long. Babies and adult snakes have poisonous teeth, their bite is dangerous (sometimes there are even deaths). But the viper never attacks a person for no reason, on the contrary, she avoids meeting with him as best she can. Cases of bites happen solely due to human negligence. Therefore, you can’t walk barefoot in the forest; when looking for mushrooms, you should stir forest floor stick - then there will be no trouble from these reptiles. Snakes are useful in that they exterminate many rodents, their venom is used in medicine. Dried viper venom retains its qualities for at least 25 years.

• The viper can inflate the chest. So, basking in the sun, she increases the surface of her body.
• A wintering place for vipers is found among the roots of trees. From year to year they use the same shelters.
• In the north, the winter shelter of the viper is underground at a depth of up to 2 m.

CHARACTERISTIC FEATURES OF THE VIPER

Cubs: 5-20 cubs are born, covered with thin skin, which they soon lose.

Female: somewhat larger than the male, the stripe on her brown body is slightly lighter.

Eyes: the vertical pupil notices any horizontal movement.

Male: a dark zigzag stripe can be seen on its gray, brown or reddish-brown body.

Ears: missing inner ear and eardrum. Snakes are deaf and only pick up vibrations in the air.

- Habitat of common viper

WHERE Dwells

These snakes are not found in Iceland, Ireland and most of Southern Europe. Distributed in Central and Northern Europe up to the Arctic and the Far East.

PROTECTION AND PRESERVATION

Due to the reduction of natural habitats, the common viper is threatened with extinction. hedgehog is her natural enemy, it is insensitive to viper venom.

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When attacked, the snake curls up and draws its neck into the middle of the resulting flat circle, so that with each bite it quickly extends it by 15, at most 30 cm. Retraction of the neck is always a sign that the viper wants to bite, immediately after the bite, it again quickly retracts the neck preparing for the next attack. When the viper is angry, it puffs up so much that even the thinnest one seems fat. When attacking, the viper focuses primarily on lightning speed, and not on accuracy. When attacked, she often misses, but immediately makes another attempt until she achieves her goal. You have to be careful, because the viper never attacks silently.

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The common viper (Vipera berus) is a snake of the viper family (Viperidae). The body length can reach 70 cm. In addition to Russia, it is distributed almost throughout Europe and in Northeast China. It lives in swamps, forest clearings, along river banks. Winters in underground burrows. It feeds mainly on mouse-like rodents and frogs, while young snakes feed on insects. Poisonous, but cases fatality extremely rare.

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Children's popular science film about vipers from the cycle \

The steppe viper (Vipera ursinii) is a venomous snake, a well-known representative of the genus of true vipers in Russia.

The length of the body of a reptile with a head is on average 45-48 cm; a well-known record for this species is 70 cm. Females are slightly larger than males.

From above, the snake is brownish-gray in color with the same zigzag stripe along the ridge as in the common viper. Sometimes this band is broken into separate spots. On the head there is a symmetrical pattern of dark spots. Completely black individuals (melanists) among this species are very rare.

From the steppe, first of all, it differs in smaller sizes. In addition, the upper side of its head sharply passes into the lateral one, forming a pronounced rib, as a result, the lateral edge of its muzzle is pointed (it is rounded in the common one) and somewhat raised above its upper part.

habitats

The steppe viper is common in Central Asia, in the middle and Eastern Europe, in Northwest China, Turkey, Iran, Kazakhstan and the Caucasus. It's a fairly common sight for the south. Western Siberia and the south of the European part of Russia (in the north, its habitat reaches Kazan).

Unlike the common viper, the steppe is found in open spaces. It is not for nothing that she received such a name: her favorite places a habitat - different types steppes. She also lives on rocky slopes of mountains, alpine meadows, sea coasts, in riverine forests, ravines, semi-deserts and loosely fixed sands. It can also be found in pastures and fields.

In favorable habitats, its population density is extremely high. For example, in Kazakhstan, in the thickets of tea, the number of these snakes can reach up to 45 individuals per 1 ha, and in Ciscaucasia - up to 60! In such places, you can’t take a step so as not to stumble upon this snake. However, the steppe viper does not have such obvious “snake foci” as are known in the common viper - it is more evenly distributed.

The poisonousness of the steppe viper

The venom of this snake is not very strong. No cases of death from her bite of people or large animals have been recorded. Usually after 5-12 days the victim fully recovers.

Symptoms of poisoning are the same as with the bite of other vipers. In the affected area, there is a feeling of a prick, the skin turns red, a trace of two teeth is visible. After 10-20 minutes, swelling occurs at the site of the bite, sometimes significant. After a few hours, bruising and bloody blisters may appear. In addition, there appear characteristics toxic poisoning: dizziness and nausea, sometimes vomiting, severe weakness, chills, pain in various parts body, palpitations, shortness of breath.

The action of the poison is directly related to its amount that has entered the body. The amount of poison, in turn, depends on:

• season (in autumn, snakes have more poison than at other times of the year);
• the size and age of the reptile (more poison in large and old individuals);
• the interval between meals by the snake (in full snakes it is present in a larger volume than in hungry ones);
• molting stages (in molters in given time reptile poison more);
• the time interval between bites (the full volume of poison in a reptile is restored after 2 weeks).

The venom of the steppe viper also finds industrial application. These snakes, like common vipers, are kept in snake nurseries.

Lifestyle of a snake

The steppe viper leads a terrestrial lifestyle, preferring dry and sunny places. It can also crawl up trees: there are cases when they were found at a height of four meters. In addition, the reptile swims well.

The steppe viper is a diurnal snake. In spring and autumn, most often it can be found in the middle of the day. In summer, it is active in the morning and evening, and during the hot hours it sits in shelters.

Nutrition Features

The diet of the steppe viper is fundamentally different from the diet of its closest relatives. It does not feed on small mammals and lizards, but, oddly enough, insects! AT summer time she preys almost exclusively on orthoptera - locusts, grasshoppers, grasshoppers, which she catches in large quantities.

In the spring, when there are no adult insects yet, the steppe vipers have no choice but to try to hunt small rodents, lizards and anurans. However, luck does not always smile on them: most often their stomachs remain empty, because catching such prey is not an easy task for them. Sometimes they include in their diet other food available to them: spiders, lark chicks, oatmeal and other small birds, bird eggs. It happens that frogs become their prey.

After the prey is captured, vipers usually swallow it alive without using their poisonous apparatus. They digest food for two to four days.

reproduction

The mating season for steppe vipers falls on the beginning - mid-April. At this time, males are actively looking for females. Like their relatives, this species often arranges mating games: it is not uncommon to find "balls" of snakes of 6-8 individuals - usually from one female and several males attracted by her competing with each other. Also, males arrange ritual fights - the so-called "dances".

After the mating period, males, and especially females, rest for a long time on open places basking under the rays of the sun. At this time, they often catch the eye of a person.

The pregnancy of the steppe viper lasts from 90 to 130 days. The female brings live cubs; in one litter there can be a lot of them - up to 28, but usually 5-6. The length of newborn vipers is 12-18 cm. They feed mainly various insects. Shortly after birth, they molt (by the way, adults molt 3 times a year). In the third year of life, they reach a length of 30-35 cm and can already bear offspring.

Wintering

These snakes overwinter singly or in small groups in cracks in the soil, in rodent burrows, in voids between stones and other suitable shelters.

It is interesting that the steppe viper leaves for wintering in the places of its distribution later than all other reptiles, and in the spring it appears earlier than others - in the south of the range already in late February - early March. It can be found even in winter, during the thaw, when the temperature rises to + 4 ° C.

Enemies of the steppe viper

When meeting with a person or other possible danger, the reptile tries to retreat as quickly as possible. But since she is rather slow, she does not always manage to crawl away. In this case, she actively defends herself, raising her head on an S-shaped curved neck, which at any moment her head is instantly “thrown” towards the enemy. And she has enough enemies: these are owls, steppe eagles, harriers, black storks, hedgehogs, badgers, foxes, wild boars, steppe ferrets. But, as for many other representatives of the fauna, the most serious enemy for her is man. People catch reptiles for the purpose of prey snake venom, and often they kill simply because of their ignorance any snake they meet on the way - a lot of vipers die only because of superstitious fears of snakes.

AT last years the population of the steppe viper is noticeably reduced. This happens due to the plowing of the steppes, construction and reclamation work, as well as due to direct destruction by man.

In contact with

There are not so many dangerous and poisonous animals in Russia. However, they are among them - the common viper. It is better to look at a photo of a poisonous beauty in order to know how she looks. And this is necessary in order to be able to distinguish it from harmless snake with which she is very similar.

Who has not heard of the existence of viper snakes? For some they are interesting, someone is afraid of them. It is easy to find out that the viper is a reptile of the Viper family and the genus Real vipers, belonging to the scaly order. But what is this snake? What features does she have?

The common viper is one of the few poisonous snakes living in the European part of Eurasia

Appearance of a viper

Against the background of its relatives, the viper looks like a small snake: indeed, on average, this type of snake grows no more than seventy centimeters. The largest vipers are on the Scandinavian Peninsula - there their length reaches a meter. By the way, female vipers are often larger than males.

The head of the viper is quite large and flat. A special part of the body called the cervical interception separates the head from the long torso of the viper. The pupils of this snake are vertical, it has a lot of shields and scales on its body, giving the viper a truly awesome look.

In the world you can find black, brown, brownish or gray snakes with a zigzag pattern. But not all vipers have stripes on their backs. In some areas you can see melanistic vipers - snakes with a body painted completely black.

Viper's habitat

The main danger of the viper lies in the fact that it is quite possible to meet it in mixed forest or near a river. In Russia, the viper lives in the European part, and in Siberia, and in the Far East. This snake lives even in the mountains, at an altitude of about three kilometers above sea level.

Vipers are settled in their habitats quite unevenly: in some areas their number reaches one hundred individuals per hectare! True, this happens very rarely. In May, vipers wake up from hibernation and crawl out of their winter shelters. That's when you can suffer from their bites.

I wonder what the viper eats?

Obviously, the viper uses venom to kill prey. Who can she kill? Small rodents, or rather, voles and spindles. Vipers, being reptiles, eat, in fact, their relatives - small lizards and. Small chicks of warblers and buntings that have fallen out of the nest are a frequent prey for this species of snake.
Young vipers eat differently. It is difficult to call their prey and prey something - these are small bugs, caterpillars, ants. However, snakes that have not yet grown up are quite capable of eating even small insects.

viper breeding

In May, when the vipers have just woken up from their winter sleep, they have a breeding season. The viper is a viviparous snake, which is rare: in August-September, the cubs hatched in the womb are born. Small (about fifteen centimeters long) vipers usually hatch more than ten. Interestingly, sometimes a viper wraps around a tree trunk during childbirth, so that the tail with future snakes dangles in the air and the children fall to the ground. By the way, the cubs immediately molt and become independent (and already poisonous!). So do not think that small vipers are safe for human health and life.

Viper features

A characteristic feature of vipers is a zigzag pattern on the back of a lighter (or contrasting) color. However, sometimes vipers do not have this distinctive pattern. This may be when the snake has melanism - the coloring of the entire body in black. In this case, the viper can be confused with some other snake.

But it is difficult to confuse a viper with a snake: the latter will be “given out” by the absence of yellow stripes on the head and a small body length (snakes can grow up to two meters, unlike a viper).

Enemies of the viper in nature

Despite the fact that the viper is poisonous and crawls fast enough, it has natural enemies that it cannot cope with. These include , etc. Oddly enough, the viper's venom, which acts on humans, has virtually no effect on these animals.

The viper has other dangerous enemies. These are birds. They are able to "attack" the viper from the air. The most dangerous birds for this type of snake are serpent eagles, as well as owls and storks.

Viper - benefit or harm to humans?

Everyone knows that the viper is a very dangerous snake because it is poisonous. But not everyone knows that the viper will never bite just like that: it always defends itself, and does not attack, acting on the principle of " The best defense is an attack." In fact, the bite of a viper is rarely fatal, and the consequences of the bite - a small swelling and pain - disappear on their own after a few days. However, do not neglect the safety rules.