{"id":745,"date":"2026-10-24T14:01:44","date_gmt":"2026-10-24T14:01:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bugleblast.com\/?p=745"},"modified":"2026-10-24T14:01:44","modified_gmt":"2026-10-24T14:01:44","slug":"dwarf-reed-snakes-cartwheel-roll-12-feet-per-second","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bugleblast.com\/?p=745","title":{"rendered":"THESE SNAKES DON\u2019T SLITHER. THEY CARTWHEEL AWAY AT 12 FEET A SECOND! | Tiny Borneo reed snakes roll four times faster than they crawl, and they keep their heads dead steady while they do it"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>FORGET SLITHERING! Tiny, secretive <strong>dwarf reed snakes<\/strong> in Southeast Asia escape danger by arching their bodies and <strong>tumbling away like a wheel<\/strong>, and scientists have now clocked them at up to <strong>12.1 feet per second (3.69 meters per second)<\/strong>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.livescience.com\/animals\/snakes\/watch-bizarre-snake-cartwheel-away-from-danger-at-more-than-12-feet-per-second\">Live Science<\/a> reported.<\/p>\n<p>The new study, published Monday, Oct. 19, in the journal <strong>Current Biology<\/strong>, filmed three species of the genus <em>Pseudorabdion<\/em> from multiple angles between 2019 and 2022, mostly in the Malaysian state of Sarawak on Borneo. On average, the snakes\u2019 peak speed while rolling was <strong>four times<\/strong> their normal slithering speed. \u201cRolling allows them to escape from danger very quickly,\u201d said first author <strong>Yosuke Kojima<\/strong>, a biology lecturer at Toho University in Japan.<\/p>\n<p>The trick: rolling usually scrambles an animal\u2019s head and senses, which is why so few creatures do it. These snakes keep their <strong>heads relatively fixed, facing forward and often lifted off the ground<\/strong>, while the back of the body spins, according to the study and a Toho University summary on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sciencedaily.com\/releases\/2026\/10\/261023023718.htm\">ScienceDaily<\/a>. They can even roll in a fairly straight line along a racetrack just 8 inches wide, and often finish by diving under a nearby object.<\/p>\n<p>Three related reed snakes from another genus, <em>Calamaria<\/em>, didn\u2019t do it at all. \u201cBehavioral innovation can give rise to surprising new abilities that we would not expect from an animal\u2019s appearance alone,\u201d Kojima said.<\/p>\n<p>Why bother? Researchers have speculated the move confuses predators, and earlier work suggested a rolling snake leaves a patchy scent trail that could throw off scent-hunting king cobras. Spiders and caterpillars can tumble too, but these snakes appear to be the ones that actually steer.<\/p>\n<p><em>Featured image: AI-generated editorial illustration by Bugle Blast.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><strong>Sources:<\/strong> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.livescience.com\/animals\/snakes\/watch-bizarre-snake-cartwheel-away-from-danger-at-more-than-12-feet-per-second\">Live Science<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sciencedaily.com\/releases\/2026\/10\/261023023718.htm\">ScienceDaily (Toho University)<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Tiny Borneo reed snakes roll four times faster than they crawl, and they keep their heads dead steady while they do it<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":744,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-745","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/bugleblast.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/bb-rolling-snake-1024.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugleblast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/745","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugleblast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugleblast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugleblast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugleblast.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=745"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bugleblast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/745\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugleblast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/744"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugleblast.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=745"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugleblast.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=745"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugleblast.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=745"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}