Why Do Snakes Use Their Tongue?

Video Transcript

"How does a snake use it's tongue? Well, what a snake does with its tongue is it's smelling essentially. It's taking its tongue, and you can see the tongue is forks and it is using those forked ends to snag scent out of the air and then the tips of that tongue carry the scent into the head in this general area to what's called the Jacobsen's organ. Now the Jacobsen's organ is a little organ specialized that takes those scents deciphers what they are, how far away they are, and at which direction they are. That's why he has a forked tongue, because he can spread those forks out and help delineate which direction what smell is coming from. This is all very important because this is how snakes judge a lot of things such as terrain, movement, whether or not there's prey or predator coming. And it also adds to their charm. You'll notice that he'll smell more or less depending on what he's doing. If he feels relatively safe and at home he's not going to smell as much with that little tongue of his because he doesn't feel it's necessary but if he's startled or if he thinks there's prey around that tongue will start flickering because he's trying to figure out what is going on."