Reptiles: The Beautiful and the Deadly
June 8, 2013 - January 19, 2014
See them with your own eyes - fascinating living reptiles from around the world!
Looking for some close encounters of the scaly kind? Then head to the Reptiles: The Beautiful and the Deadly exhibit at the Museum.
See live snakes, colorful lizards, bizarre turtles, attentive alligators, and secretive crocodiles exhibited in naturalistic habitats. Most of the reptiles in the exhibit cannot be found in Mississippi.
Some of the reptiles in the exhibit include:
- Cobra: the snake charmer's snake. The hood is made by raising the head and stretching the ribs of the neck. The venom is highly toxic and causes paralysis.
- Water Monitor: a giant of the lizard world, this species grows to over seven feet in length. Strong jaws and a powerful tail make it formidable.
- Green Tree Python: high in the canopy of the rainforest the green coloration makes this snake nearly invisible to predators and prey. It kills by constriction.
- Mangrove Snake: An example of a venomous snake with short grooved teeth in the rear of its upper jaw. The bite is seldom dangerous to humans, but can paralyze a lizard or other small prey animal.
- Chameleon: these delicate tree-dwelling lizards look like they're from another planet. Eyes that move independently, skin that changes color with a mood and a tongue longer than the body make them unique.
The exhibition is loaded with cool facts about reptiles and plenty of hands-on action. A push of a button and "venom" drips from the tip of a model rattlesnake's fang. Open and close a model viper skull to expose the long fangs. And did you know crocodiles and alligators talk to one another? You can learn to talk croc, too! At other stations, you can flip boards and push buttons to learn about these cold-blooded creatures. For example:
- Snakes shed their skins at intervals - some a half dozen or more times a year.
- Turtles and tortoises don't have teeth. Instead they have sharp, serrated beaks, like birds.
- What's one way to tell the difference between a crocodile and an alligator? The crocodile has a narrow and pointy snout; an alligator has a wide, rounded snout.
Reptiles: The Beautiful and the Deadly comes to Jackson from Clyde Peeling's Reptiland in Allenwood, Pennsylvania.
Shop for unique reptile related gifts in the Museum's Dragonfly Shoppe.
The exhibit is sponsored locally by:
- Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries, and Parks
- Mississippi Museum of Natural Science Foundation
- Sanderson Farms
- Gertrude C. Ford Foundation
- Janet and Luther Ott Charitable Fund of the Community Foundation of Greater Jackson
- Nissan
- Regions Bank
- Ergon
- Chris and Steve Zachow
- Marianne & Jack Dempsey
- Sheila Smith
