Rattlesnake

Rattlesnake
Background information
Short films	Birds in the Spring
Animators	Norman Ferguson Clyde Geronimi
Character information
Likes	Eating prey
Dislikes	His prey escaping
Paraphernalia	Rattle
Status	Trapped

The Rattlesnake is a character from the 1933 Silly Symphony short Birds in the Spring.

Background

Personality

The rattlesnake is a diamondback rattlesnake that shows a hostile personality to any prey that he encounters, often being a predator to them. He is shown to sense any nearby prey that would come near him such as Otto. Like real-life rattlesnakes, the rattlesnake uses his tail to distract prey and lead them into danger.

Physical appearance

The rattlesnake has a brown coloration all over his body with a pattern of black and red markings for his scales. He also has a pair of yellow undersides, two fangs, a pink sheath tongue, and a black forked tongue as well as a pair of yellow eyes and a pair of black sinister eyebrows. He also has a pale yellow rattle located at the end of his tail.

Role in the short

Otto encounters the rattlesnake hiding behind some flowers and as he interacts with his tail, the snake emerges and attempts to hypnotize him. Otto, standing on a branch, is hypnotized by the snake's eyes, putting him in danger as he attempts to eat him, only for Otto to fall into the water, just as he attempts to escape from him.

Later, the rattlesnake uses his rattle as a motorboat propeller while chasing Otto across the pond. Just as the snake attempts to eat Otto while hopping on land, it leaps and forms into the shape of a wheel, leaving Otto trapped inside. The snake then hits a log, giving Otto some room. Otto then leaps into the log's holes, causing the snake to chase him across each hole but not before tying itself into a knot, leaving the snake unable to move. The snake does not appear again throughout the rest of the short.

Trivia

• In real life, rattlesnakes (and all species of snakes) do not actually hypnotize their prey unlike the one seen in Birds in the Spring.
• The way the rattlesnake swims on the pond while chasing Otto is a reference to how real-life rattlesnakes are capable of swimming.