How Do Snakes Have Babies?
Snakes can have live births, or they can lay eggs in order to have babies. Snake can reproduce every one to three years, and they can have up to 150 snake babies at a time.
Boas, rattle snakes and garter snakes give birth to live young. Baby snakes develop inside their mother’s body, and they are born in a thin, slimy membrane that protects them from the environment. The snakes break out of the membrane using an egg tooth. Many other snake species give birth to live young. All live young are left to survive without the help of the mother snake.
Coral snakes and pythons lay eggs. Snake eggs are soft, leathery shells. The shells do not resemble the shells of bird eggs. The baby snakes use an egg tooth to break through the egg soon after hatching. Snakes do not stay with their young. Most mother snakes leave their eggs without waiting for the baby snakes to be born. Some snakes will stay until the baby snakes are born, but then they leave their babies to hunt for themselves.
The egg tooth used to break free from the egg or the sac is lost shortly after being born. The baby snakes slither away to hunt for food.
