Do snakes have ears?

[arvind]

There is less known about this topic. Can anyone give me right explaination

[Theraphosid]

They have inner ears but no outer ear, or eardrum for that matter. They 'hear' by feeling vibrations in the ground.

[arvind]

thanks for the reply but how the water snakes listen?

[Theraphosid]

Snakes who primarily hunt in water have more of an advantage because vibrations and sounds are carried further through the water.

[arvind]

By what part of their body they feel sound? By under skin or something else? Please tell me in more detail.

[victor]

Actually they feel the sounds through vibration that penetrates their skin so the sound wave vibrates the cilia membrane inside the inner ears and the information will be sent fron those cilia membrane to the sensory part..
But, the truth is, snake doesn't use their ears oftenly like us..their organs are specialized for smelling I think..

[biostudent84]

Aye. Smelling and tasting, since the two senses are strongly linked together. Notice how they are constantly flicking their tounges.

[victor]

They taste their surrounding air...why I can't do that when I flick my tongue??

[MrMistery]

Sorry to contradict the master
My zoology book snakes have a very low sense of taste, mainly because they swallow the prey hole. Also, their tongue is used for touching things. The feel things with their tongue just like people do with their hands. Smell is indeed very well developed

[victor]

Oops..sorry, I think I forgot to put quotation mark at my 'taste' word before.. (classical way to run from mistake)

[paupackard]

"Actually they feel the sounds through vibration that penetrates their skin so the sound wave vibrates the cilia membrane inside the inner ears and the information will be"

I thought that only mammals had inner ears. I thought it was part of the definition of a mammal that they had only one bone in their jaw and the other bones transformed into their inner ear.

[Beetle]

The primary jaw join of lower tetrapods has migrated into middle ear of mammals and became two of three bones (malleus, incus). The third bone is columella (stapes) which is analog (at least the part of it) to the columella of reptiles. Snakes sense vibrations through this bone. The distal part of it is surrounded with tissue that conduct vibrations from air (less), ground (more) and water.

Sankes flick their toung to collect smell particles (but different from those that nose can detect ) from air and then they touch their "palat". From there lead a channel to the vomeronazal organ or Jackobson`s organ which is additional (or maybe main) olfactory organ.