A snake is a long, legless reptile covered in dry, overlapping scales that belongs to the suborder Serpentes. Its elongated, slender body is highly flexible due to a unique backbone containing hundreds of vertebrae and ribs, which allows it to move across various terrains without limbs. Lacking external ears and eyelids, a snake protects its unblinking eyes with transparent scales and navigates the world using specialized senses. It frequently flicks its forked tongue to collect scent particles from the air, transferring them to an internal organ to track surroundings and prey. As cold-blooded ectotherms, snakes cannot generate their own body heat and rely heavily on their environment—like basking in the sun or hiding underground—to regulate their temperature. Because of this adaptability, they thrive in diverse habitats worldwide, including forests, deserts, oceans, and grasslands, with the exception of freezing polar regions. All snakes are strictly carnivorous, feeding on rodents, birds, insects, and fish. To digest their meals, they possess highly flexible, unhinging jaws that enable them to swallow prey much larger than their own heads. Depending on the species, snakes hunt either by delivering venom through specialized fangs or by using powerful body muscles to constrict and suffocate their prey.