For many people, a “giant den” filled with 2,000 rattlesnakes is not the best binge-watching experience. 24 hour webcam Colorado’s snake viewing parks provide valuable observation opportunities for scientists and snake enthusiasts, helping to deepen our understanding of these rare (and unfairly maligned) reptiles.
The secluded spot on private land in northern Colorado is nestled in a hillside full of crevices where the snakes can stay warm and hide from predators.
“This is a very large den for a rattlesnake. It’s one of the largest dens that we know of,” Emily Taylor, a biology professor at California State Polytechnic University who is leading the Project Rattlesnake research, said Tuesday.
Caltech researchers installed the webcams in May, building on knowledge gained from earlier webcams they had placed in rattlesnake dens in California. The exact locations in Colorado are being kept secret to keep snake lovers — and snake haters — at bay, Taylor said.
High-elevation Colorado rattlesnakes retreat to dens during the winter and emerge in the spring, but their active season is shorter than that of their Southwestern counterparts. Only pregnant female snakes are in the dens at this time of year, while males migrate to nearby lowlands.
The babies are born in August: they are called pups, and unlike most other reptiles, they are born live rather than hatching from eggs.
Also, unlike other snakes, mother rattlesnakes care for their young, protecting them from predators and using their bodies to shield them. Rattlesnakes will also sometimes care for the young of other snakes.
“Rattlesnakes are actually very good mothers. People don’t know that,” Taylor said.
The webcams help scientists observe the snakes’ behavior without being intrusive, while online viewers alert them to events the scientists miss and offer their own knowledge of the local environment.
“This is truly a group effort, a community science effort, and it’s something we as scientists cannot do alone,” Taylor said.
Sometimes drama happens.
Red-tailed hawks circled overhead, waiting to swoop down and eat a meal, and at one point a black, white and blue, long-tailed magpie, a relative of crows, snatched a baby rattlesnake.
When it rains, rattlesnakes curl up and drink water from a cup formed on their body.
Taylor expects a surge in activity after the baby snakes are born, and then even more in September as snakes return from surrounding areas to prepare for winter.
Rattlesnakes have a bad reputation as creepy and scary, but Taylor said the webcams show they are social animals that don’t go out of their way to be aggressive.
“I try to speak up for the underdog and let people know there’s another side to rattlesnakes that’s worthy of admiration,” Taylor said.
