Move over, python — this tiny snake holds the record for swallowing the largest prey whole relative to body size

Snakes are identified for gulping down really gargantuan meals. Nonetheless, one species of serpent outpaces all of them, consuming the biggest prey relative to its dimension of any identified snake — and it isn’t the python.

Often known as the Gans’ egg-eater (Dasypeltis gansi), this skinny, nonvenomous African snake has a gape so large that it could actually swallow spherical fowl eggs complete regardless of its diminutive dimension, which tops out at about 40 inches (102 centimeters) in size. Its capacity to dine on prey a lot bigger than itself comes from the stretchy pores and skin that connects the snake’s left and proper decrease jawbones, permitting it to open its maw exceedingly large, in accordance with a examine revealed Aug. 8 within the Journal of Zoology.