ISO, crocodilian

[JHherpetofauna]

I saw a study on Integumentary sense organs on the National Geographic channel awhile back. These Dermal sensory receptor pits seem to be more "used" in the juveniles. The exact use of these are still unknown i think. As i go to the Everglades allot and take photographs of gators , i noticed while i lure them close to the bank with a light splash of my snake hook that the smaller gators come almost immediately,the larger ones 9ft plus dont seem to come at all in some cases. The study they did was to take a liquid plastic and paint it on these pits and take vasilene andinject it into the ears of the gators then send pulses into the water at night to see if they responded. The smaller ones didnt move one bit with the plastic and vasiline aswell as the adult. As soon as the plasticwas taken off the
sensory pits they came over to the pulses immediatly, but the adult didnt move either way. I have just got very interested in these pits. I havnt seen any further research on them anywhere on the internet or anywhere that i could find. Would anybody know any new information on these or where to find them. Thanks, jason

[KrokadilyanGuy3]

Integumentary Sense Organs were research a few years ago in Australia as a thought of maybe the sensory organs were possible electroreceptors. They, however, found no evidence that the croc could detect electrical fields..
So, they went back to being thought of as pressure receptors. The receptors have been known since the 1960s when Peter Braziatis described them, but have only been studied within recent years. I believe Daphne Soares (University of Maryland) has been the leading scientist on testing these receptors.. She also renamed them as DPRs, even though there are also similar receptors spread across the entire body of Crocodiles and Gharials that still need to be studied. That, and why Alligatoridae don't have any..

Anyway, http://www.wam.umd.edu/~daph/DPR.html is her site if you care to watch video feed of her studies. Her email is on there if you want any up to date information as well...
Xain

[Sunrunner]

LOL is there anything you dont know Xain :) you are truly a benifit to this forum :)

[JHherpetofauna]

thanks for the help

[KrokadilyanGuy3]

Heh, Im really ********. Truely. Just so happens though that me and a friend were thinking of doing our own tests with a few of my animals dealing with moderately high water pressure. I decided against it since these were my animals and I really dont know what Im doing, and I didnt want to by chance hurt them..
Imma' pansy..

[JHherpetofauna]

I would love to do test like that but am to young to obtain a permit to catch gators ect.. . I used to be on the reptile chat on AOL and if your the xain i think ( palustris3 or something like that) than i think you would be fine doing them tests, you knowing a hell of allot about crocodilians. Only thing i would be afraid of doing to hurt them gators is they where saying the wrong type of pulse can shock/injure the gator threw the water . Not sure really. Best of luck on it if you decide to do so. later, Jason

[KrokadilyanGuy3]

Heh, yup that's me. What was your sn? You the Colorado toad (Jason) or?

[JHherpetofauna]

I used to be the little jurk "floridaherp" always trying to start things in there.