What is the common diet of a rattlesnake?

The common diet of a rattlesnake includes rodents and other small mammals, lizards and birds. Rattlesnakes kill their prey by injecting venom into their victims through their two sharp fangs.

Rattlesnakes do most of their hunting at night. To capture their prey, rattlesnakes lie motionless, sensing the air around them with a keen sense of smell in both their nostrils as well as their tongues. When a small animal approaches, the rattler delivers a swift bite, injecting its victim with a hemo-toxic venom which leads to swelling, paralysis and death. Once the prey is dead, the snake swallows it whole. After eating, a rattlesnake takes about two weeks to digest its prey.