The origin of snakes

[Edwin]

Link:
http://customwire.ap.org/dynamic/stories/S/SNAKE_DEBATE?SITE=MNMAN&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT

[Lisa]

Pretty cool, makes you go HMMMM.

[scalawag]

Hmmmmmmmm. You're right!

[Jeff_Favelle]

Odd that they didn't mention the vestigal spurs in Boids.

[Smilts]

i think the spurs would further prove there point. But im inclined not to beleive all that scientifical crap i think snakes and all other animals evolved from snakes and all other animals. sorry just what i think

[Jeff_Favelle]

Snakes evolved from snakes?? LOL. So one day, a snake just APPEARED out of thin air? How did it EVOLVE?

[Yness]

Jeff its a series of reverse steps...you see all living creatures are evolved from snakes...amoebas to blue whales to bald eagles to yes even the common king snake!!! :o

[Jeff_Favelle]

LOL!

[Scales Zoo]

I wonder what land based lizards snakes evolved from?

Maybe the forked tounge of monitors and snakes are convergent evolution. I assume that is one of the reasons it was thought snakes evolved from monitor lizards.

I always wondered if snakes evolved from varanids, why varanids were "smarter" than snakes. Now maybe I have an answer to that one.

Ryan

[Katt]

Good question Ryan. The article doesn't say what land lizard snakes are closely related to, but snakes may have branched so far back that it (the ancestor) might already be extinct and further may not be present in the fossil record. However, any other lizard "lines" that are derived from the same ancestor would share a few traits (base pairs?) with snakes. Any genetic testing with those species would point to a common ancestor.

"We can exclude monitors - that's statistically supported,

I guess this means genetically monitors and snakes don't share a lot. That's pretty darn shocking.

[Scales Zoo]

Legless lizards have eyelids, many geckos, like snakes, do not.

Until recently I assumed all lizards had eyelids - I wonder if they evolved eyelids (from having none), or if some lizards (and then snakes) lost them.

Ryan

[Katt]

I think that snakes could have evolved from something like a sand skink. They burrow a lot and one species does have transparent eyelids.


There is usually an external ear opening and eyes with eyelids, although a few species have vestigial eyes and one species has a transparent "window" in a fused eyelid.

From http://www.nafcon.dircon.co.uk/skinks.htm

[JimmyDavid]

I always had a theory of my own about that. I think snakes evolved from fish (so, my theory is similar to that of those guys).
The more i think of it, the more sense it makes to me. Think about it.

[Katt]

We all evolved from fish.

[Linds]

Originally posted by Katt
We all evolved from fish.

Yup... as far as they have been able to go back, it looks to be we all came out of the ocean :D