united states of tara Snakes fight: Dancing timber rattlesnakes clash in rare battle over female mate

Credit: Pen News/Chris Rogers

MESMERISING footage has captured two deadly rattlesnakes in a mysterious dance that experts say is a fight over a female.
Chris Rogers, 38, was horrified when he encountered the timber rattlesnakes on his usual running route in Frozen Head State Park, Tennessee, USA.
It was the second time in as many weeks that he’d seen the state’s biggest and most dangerous breed of snake on the trail, having never encountered them there before.
“This trail makes a small three-mile loop that friends and I use for a small run in the evenings after work,” he said.
“Typically we know the snakes are there somewhere but we don't usually see them.”
Initially Chris had assumed the snakes were mating, but the experts give a more unnerving answer.
They think the two snakes were battling over a female who Chris never spotted, but who was right there with him watching the fight unfold.
“It is been widely argued and debated,” said Chris. “Half say mating. Half say fighting.
“The Knoxville zoo says they were fighting over a female who should have been watching.
“I never saw a third snake, but knowing a different rattler was there two weeks ago, there’s a good chance it’s true."
“It’s nerve-racking anytime I see a snake, but especially when it's rattlers or copperheads,” he added.
Herpetologist Phil Colcouch, of Zoo Knoxville, told local media that if the snakes were fighting, they would have been indifferent to anything but the battle at hand.
"They're pretty oblivious to the world around them. They are laser-focused on that combat," he said.
As for Chris, from nearby Warburg, Tennessee, he’s planning to stay off the trail until winter.
“I may just wait until cooler weather,” he said.
“They den up in colder months, but from July to October they are breeding and the males will travel to find a female.
“Female rattle snakes only breed every two to four years, so to have male snakes fight over a female – and to see it – is really rare.”
According to the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency (TWRA), the timber rattlesnake is the largest and most dangerous of the four venomous snakes in the state.
Mr Rogers, a technology coordinator for Morgan County Schools, wasn’t around to see who won the fight and when he returned to the spot with a park worker, the snakes had left.

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united states of tara Snakes fight: Dancing timber rattlesnakes clash in rare battle over female mate
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