Episode Transcript
Speaker 0 00:03 Welcome to brain junk. I'm Amy Barton and I'm trace Kerr and it's time for a brainstorm. So I'm talking to the youngest kid and they say, when a really big snake is eating something, how does it breathe? I sat there with my mouth hanging open going, well it uh huh compression and Oh it's not getting any air. Well, uh, that's not actually true. They continue to breathe while they're swallowing stuff. Okay. Snakes have nostrils like we do. They breathe through their noses, but they can also breathe through their mouths through something called a glottidis. So I'm going to put in the show notes, a YouTube video that shows a snake. Its mouth is open and right there underneath the tongue you see this whole open up, it looks almost like the opening of a straw and it opens and closes as the snake breeds. Oh, weird.
Speaker 0 01:05 Yeah. And then so say your snake has caught a mouse and as they begin to get the mouse all lined up and they're going to swallow it, they push that Gladys forwards and it sticks out usually about the side of its mouth. Like where we would have it, the corner of our mouth, and you can see it open and close to breathe while it is swallowing like a snake snorkel. It weird will is going to want to know about this? Yes, it is a snake snorkel. So where are their lungs then? Because like there's gotta be some compression on Oregon's happening there, but I'd never also considered where a snake organs are. The lungs are down along the sides. And I watched another video, which I'm also going to put the notes do, but this is definitely not PG 13. And if you do not want to see an animal eating an animal, this will not be the one for you. Uh, but you can see as it's swallowing, it's like deep breath and then I'm going to swallow a bit. Ah, and they just kind of stagger it as they go. Ah, nanny snake, that's going to swallow you, has hugged you until you're no longer breathing anymore anyway. Right. So your limp noodle and they're just going to breathe out the side of their mouth while they swell you. Cause there's a happy thought. Wow.
Speaker 0 02:28 That's amazing. Okay, so, but here's an extra bonus. Fun fact. There's a small piece of cartilage that's inside the Gladys that vibrates when a snake breathes out really hard. And that's the hiss we think of when we think of snakes. Really? Yeah. It's not the tongue. It's air being pushed over that Gladys. So we're going to listen to hear the sound of a Cobra, his hissing, and that's all the sound from the Gladys and it's this weird Graley sound. <inaudible>
Speaker 1 03:04 <inaudible>. <inaudible>
Speaker 0 03:10 that blows my mind that that completely changes my view of snakes. Not that I gave them a lot of thought in daily life, but my 13 year old son gives them a fair amount, so blow his mind or he knows he'll be like, I know mom. Okay, this right here. This is the trapped at home power move episode that you can throw it to your kids. How does a snake breathe? And you just see that vacant expression that I also had on my face on their faces. Yes. And that's my brainstorm. That was a really great brainstorm. Thank you.
Speaker 1 03:48 <inaudible>
Speaker 0 03:50 all right, team. Don't forget you can ask your smart speaker to play brain junk podcasts, but make sure you do it politely. Always say, please do your smart speaker. You can also find us on Twitter as at my brain junk, and we're on Facebook and Instagram as brain junk podcast trace and I will catch you next time when we share more of everything you never knew you wanted to know, and I guarantee you will not be bored.
Speaker 1 04:15 <inaudible>.
