Q 01/05
A) The true vipers (Viperinae)
B) The night adders (Azemiopinae)
C) The Fea's vipers (Azemiops)
D) The pit vipers (Crotalinae)
Answer · why
The 'pit' is the heat-sensing organ between eye and nostril that lets them target warm-blooded prey in the dark.
Q 02/05
A) Every continent but Antarctica
B) Africa and the Americas
C) Australia and the Americas
D) The Americas only
Answer · why
Their range runs from southern Canada to central Argentina, with most species in the American Southwest and Mexico.
Q 03/05
A) 36
B) 12
C) 60
D) 100
Answer · why
Between them they have 65 to 70 subspecies; the ancestral homeland is thought to be Mexico's Sierra Madre Occidental.
Q 04/05
A) Western diamondback
B) Timber rattlesnake
C) Eastern diamondback
D) Mojave rattlesnake
Answer · why
One shot in 1946 measured 2.4 metres and weighed 15.4 kg; a $200 reward for an eight-footer, dead or alive, was never claimed.
Q 05/05
A) Rattle-tail
B) Death
C) Castanet
D) Desert
Answer · why
The other rattlesnake genus, Sistrurus, means 'tail rattler' and shares a root with the Egyptian sistrum.
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