Python Unhinge Jaw

Once the prey has been successfully asphyxiated, the python's incredible ability to stretch and unhinge its jaw comes into play again. It slowly begins to consume the prey, starting from the head and gradually working its way down the body.

20 Shocking Snake Attacks Caught On Tape Do pythons dislocate their jaw? It's widely and falsely believed that snakes can dislocate or unhinge their jaws to swallow prey. In reality, an elastic piece of connective tissue stretches from the snake's braincase, or cranium, to its lower jaw, thus enabling the animal to gobble ginormous grub.

How does a snakes jaws work? The lower jaw bones of snakes are instead connected at the chin by elastic-like tendons imagine a rubber band. This allows snakes to really open their mouths up to consume massive prey or also give epic yawns!

Future work will explore what properties make the pythons' jaws so flexible. Just because a python can eat a whole deer doesn't mean venison is often on the menu.

Of course, you may not be bringing your ball python a mouse so large that it needs to unhinge its jaw, but it will be ready if you do. Yawning before eating a meal is actually a very complicated process for your ball python. In nature, ball pythons must be able to grasp their prey by its neck and shouldersso the prey animal won't bite back.

A snake's ability to swallow enormous prey has long been a source of fascination, but the common explanation that they dislocate their jaws is a myth.

Once the prey is dead, the python will begin to swallow it whole. Pythons have an extremely flexible jaw that can unhinge from their skull, allowing them to stretch their mouth wide enough to swallow prey much larger than their own head.

A Burmese python swallows a large rabbit Credit JP Dunbar If there is one aspect of snake anatomy and physiology that everybody is familiar with, it is probably their ability to consume prey many times larger than their own skull. One of the most bizarre feats one can witness in nature, is an egg-eating snake ingesting a massive egg. Even more amazing, and perhaps a little unsettling, is the

But how can reptiles with such small heads eat animals so big? Contrary to popular belief, pythons don't unhinge their jaws to gulp down their food.

It's widely and falsely believed that snakes can dislocate or unhinge their jaws to swallow prey.