Editing Snake (section)

==== Molting ====
[[File:Nerodia sipedon shedding.JPG|thumb|left|A [[common watersnake]] shedding its skin]]
[[Molting]] (or "ecdysis") serves a number of purposes - it allows old, worn skin to be replaced and can be synced to mating cycles, as with other animals. Molting occurs periodically throughout the life of a snake. Before each molt, the snake regulates its diet and seeks defensible shelter. Just before shedding, the skin becomes grey and the snake's eyes turn silvery. The inner surface of the old skin liquefies, causing it to separate from the new skin beneath it. After a few days, the eyes clear and the snake reaches out of its old skin, which splits. The snake rubs its body against rough surfaces to aid in the shedding of its old skin. In many cases, the castaway skin peels backward over the body from head to tail in one piece, like taking the dust jacket off a book, revealing a new, larger, brighter layer of skin which has formed underneath.<ref name="RSSlimy"/><ref name="GenSnakeInfo">{{cite web|url=http://www.sdgfp.info/Wildlife/Snakes/SnakeInfo.htm |title=General Snake Information |website=sdgfp.info |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071125210255/http://www.sdgfp.info/Wildlife/Snakes/SnakeInfo.htm |archive-date=November 25, 2007 |url-status=dead}}</ref> Renewal of the skin by molting supposedly increases the mass of some animals such as insects, but in the case of snakes this has been disputed.<ref name="RSSlimy"/><ref name="ZooPax3">{{cite web |url=http://whozoo.org/ZooPax/ZPScales_3.htm |title=ZooPax: A Matter of Scale: Part III |website=Whozoo.org |access-date=January 9, 2016 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160116034245/http://whozoo.org/ZooPax/ZPScales_3.htm |archive-date=January 16, 2016}}</ref> Shedding skin can release pheromones and revitalize color and patterns of the skin to increase attraction of mates.<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Bauwens |first1=Dirk |last2=Van Damme |first2=Raoul |last3=Verheyen |first3=Rudolf F. |date=1989 |title=Synchronization of Spring Molting with the Onset of Mating Behavior in Male Lizards, Lacerta vivipara |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/1564326 |journal=[[Journal of Herpetology]] |volume=23 |issue=1 |pages=89–91 |doi=10.2307/1564326 |jstor=1564326 |issn=0022-1511 |access-date=29 April 2022 }}</ref>

Snakes may shed four of five times a year, depending on the weather conditions, food supply, age of the snake, and other factors.{{sfn|Campbell|Shaw|1974}}{{page needed|date=April 2024}}<ref name = "GenSnakeInfo"/> It is theoretically possible to identify the snake from its cast skin if it is reasonably intact.<ref name="RSSlimy"/> Mythological associations of snakes with symbols of [[healing]] and [[medicine]], as pictured in the [[Rod of Asclepius]], are derivative of molting.<ref name=AIM>{{cite journal |vauthors=Wilcox RA, Whitham EM |title=The symbol of modern medicine: why one snake is more than two |journal=Annals of Internal Medicine |volume=138 |issue=8 |pages=673–7 |date=April 2003 |pmid=12693891 |doi=10.7326/0003-4819-138-8-200304150-00016 |citeseerx=10.1.1.731.8485 |s2cid=19125435}}</ref>

One can attempt to identify the sex of a snake when the species is not distinctly [[Sexual dimorphism|sexually dimorphic]] by counting scales. The [[cloaca]] is probed and measured against the [[subcaudal scales]].<ref name="Rosenfeld_11">Rosenfeld (1989), p. 11.</ref> Counting scales determines whether a snake is a male or female, as the [[Hemipenis|hemipenes]] of a male being probed is usually longer.<ref name="Rosenfeld_11"/>{{clarify|reason=Is it really scale counts or are the scales merely used to measure the probe penetration?|date=July 2016}}