As Asia's telecom systems slowly recovered from the earthquakes that hit Taiwan this week, Chinese scientists said they had developed a new way of forecasting tremors - by observing the tendency of snakes to launch themselves headlong into walls.
"Of all the creatures on the Earth, snakes are perhaps the most sensitive to earthquakes," Jiang Weisong, director of the earthquake bureau in Nanning, in southern Guangxi province, told The China Daily. Serpents can sense a coming earthquake from 120km (75 miles) away, up to five days before it happens. They respond by behaving extremely erratically. "When an earthquake is about to occur, snakes will move out of their nests, even in the cold of winter. If the earthquake is a big one, the snakes will even smash into walls while trying to escape," he said.
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