Shimmer Snake

These small serpents have the most unnerving habit of vanishing in plain sight.

— Stephen Ernest, Zoologist's Guide to the Morning Shore.

  The Shimmer Snake is a species of small Serpeform reptiles that lives in the tropical jungles of The Dawn Coast and Axthet beyond. The Shimmer Snake gets its name from the way its feathers appear to ripple as they change colour.   Like the other native reptiles of the Morning Shores, the Shimmer Snake bears no common ancestry with reptiles from the Old Lands, and the resemblance is the product of convergent evolution. The Shimmer Snake has the four eyes common to Morning Shores reptiles, however unlike many other Serpeform reptiles the Shimmer Snake lacks a distinct crest, and their hide is mostly covered by small, sleek feathers with the only scales being the scutes on their underbelly.   The Shimmer Snake is highly venomous, and even a single bite can be lethal to humans, livestock, and most other native feathered reptiles.  

Colour Shifting

  The Shimmer Snake is one of the few feathered reptiles native to the Morning Shores that can do something known as Colour Shifting, the ability to actively alter the colour of their feathers in much the same way that an Old Lands chameleon or octopus can change the colour of their bodies. A Shimmer Snake is capable of replicating any colour that an artist can mix on their pallet. The exact biological mechanism behind this colour shifting ability is currently still unknown.   Shimmer Snakes use their ability to colour shift in three distinct ways. These are:

Hunting camouflage

Threat displays

Courtship displays

 

Hunting Camouflage

  While stalking prey, a Shimmer Snake adopts a hunting camouflage that helps it to avoid notice before it can deliver a venomous bite. Interestingly, it appears that there are two different techniques that Shimmer Snakes employ to create their camouflage. Any individual Shimmer Snake will exclusively use either one or the other, but will never switch between them.   There is a proposal among reptile experts to split the species into two subspecies depending on which technique is employed, however this remains controversial.    

Disruptive Camouflage

S. i. obscuralis (disputed)   The most visually straightforward approach to camouflage, a Shimmer Snake employing this technique attempts to blend itself into its immediate surroundings using background matching, and countershading to reduce self-shadowing. The fine control a Shimmer Snake has over its own colouration makes it an extremely convincing illusion in the dense jungles.    

Dazzle Camouflage

S. i. dazzali (disputed)   Counterintuitively, a Shimmer Snake employing this approach to camouflage makes no attempt to hide itself, and instead it makes itself highly visible. When it was first discovered, it was believed to be a form of threat display until further study revealed it to in fact be a novel form of hunting camouflage.   Dazzle camouflage consists of broad lines and geometric shapes of highly contrasting colours which interrupt each other and intersect at odd angles. It appears to be intended to confuse the snake's prey by making it difficult to discern in which way the snake is moving, and how quickly.   A Shimmer Snake's dazzle camouflage is completely unique, and can be used to uniquely identify any individual snake. As the snake moves forward, its dazzle pattern moves backwards along its body giving it the illusion of not moving at all. Its pattern begins to repeat itself once it grows past a certain length.   There have been rumours that a number of pirate ironclads raiding merchants off of the Dawn Coast have begun painting their hulls in a way that mimics this technique.    

Threat Displays

 

Such a hypnotic display of bright and vibrant colour. It is all too easy to fall into a trance and forget that it is about to kill you.

  When a Shimmer Snake feels threatened, it will coil up into a defensive posture from which it can easily strike and begin making itself highly visible. During its display, bright and vibrant bands of colour ripple and cascade down its length in rapid pulses. Among the greens and browns of the rainforest, Shimmer Snakes tend to prefer pulses of highly reds, purples, and blues separated by bands of black.   Many individuals who had only heard of the Shimmer Snake and its Dazzle camouflage did not recognise the threat display for what it was and were bitten as a result, often fatally.