Famous as it is for tackling snakes, the common mongoose does in fact usually come off best in fights and dangerous snakes for two reasons - first, its incredible agility, and second, its ruse of erecting its hair, which makes it look considerable larger than it is and so often causes the snake to miss its strike on the flesh. Also, like wild pigs, mongoose are said to have some natural resistance to snake venom. An animal of open scrub forests, it hunts rodents, birds and so on, and also feeds on vegetable matter. In Chitwan it is occasionally seen scavenging at the remains of tiger kills.