Interesting article about snake co-operation

[greengriff]

https://phys.org/news/2017-05-snakes-thought-solitary-eaters.html

[whistlepig]

Interesting. Thanks for sharing!

[dannybgoode]

This had been discussed in the Facebook group I frequent. It's very interesting and perhaps points to a a level of cognitive ability sometimes assumed not to exist in snakes.

There's other possible explanations too such as it simply being the case of more than one snake having the same idea but there's more examples of cooperative behaviour between groups of snakes so it wouldn't surprise me.

[chairman]

It is probably a better defense of snakes' learning ability than group dynamics. I think that snakes are smarter than they are given credit for but I don't see them as having overly sophisticated social skills.

[dannybgoode]

It is probably a better defense of snakes' learning ability than group dynamics. I think that snakes are smarter than they are given credit for but I don't see them as having overly sophisticated social skills.

There's evidence of various vipers creche'ing and evidence of familial recognition and identification of unique individuals.

Certain snakes can also be trained to an extent.

Reptiles are way way smarter than given credit for...

[jjhill001]

The article mentions there are a few other species that hunt in groups but I couldn't find any that actually do with any sort of team work, the only snakes that came up was the snake racer scenes from the marine iguana part of Planet Earth. But those are hunting only for themselves an actually eat each other.

Anyone know of any other species that do this?

[toddnbecka]

The behavior described is a long way from what I would call pack hunting.

[dannybgoode]

The behavior described is a long way from what I would call pack hunting.

I don't think the article is intending to suggest pack hunting per se but a level of cooperative hunting behaviour.

[toddnbecka]

The headline for the page I saw the article on said something about snakes hunting in packs. Apparently the article has been making the rounds on the 'net. I really don't like how facts are exaggerated or simply disregarded to draw attention to something. Seems like almost anything having to do with snakes gets sensationalized even more than shark attacks.

[Andy_G]

In this instance, could it not be just a good place to hunt and therefore a lot of individuals go there to do so? What makes this instance co-operative over collective? I like the article, and think it's really neat, but why do I feel as if something is missing in order to actually regard this behaviour as "co-operative"?