What Was the Biggest Snake on Earth?

of Mammals. But don't let this nickname fool you. Although mammals diversified like wild in the Cenozoic, Earth wasn't done with giant reptiles. Yet. Scientists break the Cnozoic down into subdivisions called epox and the first of these, the Paleocene saw the rise of Titana boa Sara genensis, a colossal snake that makes modern pythons and anaconda's look like spaghetti noodles. Species name comes from Sarah Hone, a vast coal mine in northern Colombia that produces tens of millions of tons

of coal every year. Yet coal isn't the only precious commodity available there. Working alongside the miners, paleontologists have an earth thousands of Cenozoic fossils and Sarah hone, approximately fifty eight million years old. These fossils date back to the early Paleocene and represent plants similar to bananas and coconuts, plus river fish, crocodile like predators, and turtles with shells nearly six ft or two meters long, just to name a few. These fossils tell us the area was tropical

and swampy, much like the Amazon River Delta today. Why leaved jungle trees would have flanked ancient rivers choked with water plants and out in the steaming wilderness. Titanoboa lurked. Fossils from twenty eight of these giant snakes have been recovered at sarah Holme. Unfortunately, they've yet to locate a complete scala ten. Instead, the scientific community has had to make do with an assortment of ribs, vertebra, and some

skull material. Yet even these fines speak volumes. By comparing the fossils to the bones of living snakes, we can get a pretty good idea of what Titana Boa looked like. For example, subtle clues in the vertebra indicate that the animal was what's called a bood. It makes sense geographically. Boads are a family of snakes usually found in the America's. Being non venomous, they tend to kill by constriction. Of

all the boats alive today. Titana BoA's closest relative might be the red tailed boa, a denizen of Central and South America that can grow up to thirteen feet or four meters long. If you happen to be familiar with the film A Clockwork Orange, it's the snake that Alex keeps. Titana Boa also invites comparisons to a much larger boad, the green anaconda, Weighing up to four hundred and forty pounds that's two hundred kilos. This South American serpent is

the heaviest modern snake. The biggest reliably measured specimen was over twenty seven ft or eight meters in length over in Asia. The unrelated reticulated python can exceed this figure, stretching up to twenty eight feet or eight and a half meters long in some cases, but the reddick has a sleeker frame. Experts don't think it can rival the anaconda's maximum waite. Regardless, neither serpent could have held a

candle to Titanaboa. Scientists estimate that the Paleocene predator could have been forty two to forty seven ft in total length about thirteen to fourteen meters, and theoretically it might have tipped the scales at one and a quarter tons longer than the Tyrannosaurus rex. Titanoboa Sara genensis is the biggest snake known to science, living or extinct. So here's a question, what would a snake so massive eat? Green anaconda's famously eat. Cappabert is the adorable pig sized rodents

with semi aquatic habits. Smaller cousins of the American alligator are also on their menu. When the Smithsonian created a life sized Titanaboa sculpture for display as part of its Titanaboa Monster Snake Exhibit, in it showed the mighty snake wolfing down a crocodilian. Google a picture of this. It is the fastest that I've said nope about anything. All weak and we live in nope filled times. The following year,

researchers published a description of Titanaboa as head structure. Anatomically, the reptile's teeth and jaws resemble those of modern snakes that specialize in eating fish. If Titanaboa followed suit, that would make it the only boat on record with a fish centric diet. Like the green anaconda, Titanaboa probably spent a great deal of time in bodies of water. There, it could have more easily lugged its massive body weight

around and beat the jungles sweltering heat. Researchers have side of this animal as evidence of the Paleocen's hot climate. Climate scientists think the world was far warmer in the early Paleocene than it is today, reptiles may have reaped the benefits. For the most part, snakes, lizards, turtles, and crocodiles can't generate body heat the way that mammals like us do. Instead, they maintain their vital functions by absorbing

warmth from their environments. So by taking into account titani BoA's size, scientists can make an educated guess about the environment that it lived in. By some calculations, the very existence of such a huge, cold blooded reptile indicates that Columbia must have had a mean annual temperature of eighty six to ninety three degrees fahrenheit. That's thirty to thirty four degrees celsius, and the snake reigned fifty eight million

years ago. But perhaps dead boards aren't the most reliable gauges. We spoke via email with Kale Snyderman, an earth scientist at the University of Melbourne in Australia who studies prestoric climb and ecosystems. He notes that the Pleistocene, an epoch that ended about ten thousand years ago and included Earth's most recent ice age, also had its share of big reptiles. He said many now extinct reptile species existed in the

Palistocene that were larger than their living relatives. Those extinct species lived at a time when climates pretty much everywhere were at least one to three degrees celsius, about two to five degrees fahrenheit cooler than today. Consider Varanus priscus, a komodo dragon relative the patrolled Australia during the last ice Age. At roughly fifteen feet or five and a half meters long, it was far bigger than the lizards

we have today. And speaking of saurians, the biggest getto of all time died out in its native New Zealand just a few hundred years ago. Snyderman said, neither occurred in warm climates by global standards. It could be that giant reptiles don't need an oppressively hot planet to survive and thrive. After all, petition for mammals might be a bigger check on their success. In any case, Titana boa is long gone, so is the ice age Komodo dragon

and the Great New Zealand gecko. Yet their cousins remain enriching our world with flashy scales, forked tongues, and adhesive topads. This may be an age of mammals, but there are still some wonderful reptiles among us. Today's episode was written by Mark Vancini and produced by Tyler Clang. For more on this lots of other weighty topics, visit how stuff works dot com. Brain Stuff. It's a production of I

Heart Radio. For more podcasts in My heart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.