it's been suggested here that snakes can't change their behavior in captivity. and it's been suggested they can.



I'll opt for the adaptability camp. When i first started keeping Australian Lady Gouldian Finches (ambient temps in natural range often 110 degrees F or hotter in the summer) the major books said they shouldn't be exposed to temps below 65, or they'd die.



And that might have been correct, then, when american aviculturists had only wild-caught specimens to deal with.



Years later the Goulds had been captive bred in the US for many generations, and i had gotten in the habit of not closing the windows to my bird building until temps fell to the mid-40s or lower. I had birds moulting (considered a sensitive period), breeding, on eggs, and feeding babies at those temps, without problems. My Goulds bred year-round, unlike the original, imported wild-caught specimens that stuck to a strict season. And other breeders (I live in Florida) in California reported keeping their Goulds outside and some mornings having to break skim ice off the water bowls. A friend who visits this forum and keeps snakes AND finches reminded me of that recently--he's in Michigan and brings his goulds indoors after he's had to break the skim ice on their water bowls once or twice.



It's clear to me those animals changed their behavior--in this case changed some of their environmental needs, and responses--in captivity, over time.



I would expect the same of snakes. Does that mean i ignore what can be gleaned about my snakes' behavior in the wild? Not at all. Nor did i ignore field observations pertinent to the birds: in the spring, for ex, goulds begin nest building and courting after the first spring rains (no rains, they'll skip a season) because by the time eggs are laid and hatching, the rains will have spawned a crop of seeding grasses providing food for the hatchlings. So i occasionally tried misting my birds, to simulate rain and perhaps stimulate breeding. Fact is, though, that by that time the birds were domesticated enough/adapted to the captive environment enough that i wasn't able to observe any measurable diff in breeding activity between "rain" and no rain.



terry

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