What is a snake's mating habits, when do they have babies or lay eggs? - As a general rule, snakes reproduce once or twice yearly, though the exact details of the process can be very species specific. For most snakes, mating occurs when a sexually mature female starts to release chemical pheromones at the time she is ready to mate. These chemical markers are left along the ground, signaling sexually mature males that a female is nearby. The male snake will follow the trail of pheromones to the female, and once he’s discovered her, he will begin the process of courtship. Again, the details on this process vary from snake species to snake species, but most snakes use some series of head bumping and body rubbing to work their way into a female’s good graces. Once she is accepting of the male, he will wrap his tail around hers until the openings at the end (the cloaca) meet. While snake mating takes around an hour, some snakes remain in this process for an entire day. The female snake will then wait to have either eggs or live young, but either way, once the babies are hatched/born, they are totally one their own in a matter of hours or days.
