The snake cucumber

The snake cucumber

The Snake Cucumber is the fruit of a vine that belongs to the family of the cucumber, the melon and watermelon.

Years ago, Martha Condon, a biologist from U. of Texas USA, studied the ecology of plants of the GenusGurania in the tropical jungles of Guatopo National Park, Venezuela.

These vines were found to grow to a size of over twenty meters long, and climb the tall jungle trees crowning their canopies. The plant produces showy masculine orange flower bunches that are visited by hummingbirds and butterflies, attracted by the nectar stored in their corollas.

The mature plants, when becoming large in size, produce female flowers that allow the reproduction of the plant. These flowers can be pollinated by birds and insects and, after fertilization, develops a whitish fruit cluster of small cucumbers, each about six centimeters in length.

The fruits are the food of bats and forest mice. So let us not be misled by the name "snake cucumber", since snakes are carnivorous and never eat vegetables. The name of the plant really means that their fruits are similar in shape, size and color to the eggs laid by common local snakes.