Dasypeltis scabra, Rhombic Egg-Eater

This is a Rhombic Egg-Eater, Dasypeltis scabra.  These small to medium-sized snakes, widespread in Southern and Sub-Saharan Africa, are just made to eat birds' eggs!  They can stretch their mouths wide enough to swallow eggs four times the diameter of their heads.  After swallowing, bones sticking out from the bottom of their neck vertebrae prick the egg shells and the eggs collapse.  The snake absorbs all the juicy bits and then vomits up the collapsed eggshells again!  These snakes are not poisonous and very inoffensive, but try to mimic more dangerous snakes like adders; they coil and rub their scales together to make a hissing sound when confronted.  Watercolour, from a photo by my friend Ruan Stander.