Coral snakes bite rarely yet carry fixed front fangs
About twenty-seven Old World elapids and roughly eighty-three New World ones wear the coral-snake label. Most stay hidden underground or in leaf litter, surfacing mainly after rain or to mate—and they cause under one percent of yearly U.S. snakebites.
Coral snakes are elapids, relatives of cobras, split into two camps. The Old World has 27 species in three genera, Calliophis, Hemibungarus, and Sinomicrurus, spread through Asia and Africa; the New World has 83 species in Micruroides and Micrurus, ranging from the southern United States to Argentina. Genetic studies suggest the group arose in the Old World. Species names map that spread: the blue Malaysian coral snake, the blood-bellied coral snake of Sri Lanka, a Japanese species in the Ryukyu Islands, and the Arizona coral snake, found in lowlands from Arizona to Sinaloa.
Most are secretive burrowers that live under soil or in rainforest leaf litter and surface mainly after rain or when breeding. Micrurus surinamensis is an exception, spending nearly its whole life in slow, weedy water. They eat smaller snakes, lizards, frogs, nestling birds, and small rodents, and species from humid tropical areas also take long prey such as eels and caecilians.
Their fangs are small, hollow, and fixed at the front of the mouth, and venom reaches them through a groove rather than a direct duct. Because delivery is inefficient, a coral snake tends to hang on and chew instead of striking and releasing like a viper. Its nerve-attacking venom acts slowly, weakening the muscles.
Despite that reputation, they are not aggressive and cause under 1% of US snakebites; by 2018 only two deaths from Micrurus had been confirmed in the country over a century, and Micruroides has never caused a medically serious bite. They breed in spring to early summer and again in late summer to early autumn, with tropical species breeding more continuously. Captives live about seven years.
Source: Coral snake
