I'll try formulate an account of the study I conducted as part of my SYS project at school
.... this might take a whiley ...
As I was always keenly interested in biology I took it to SYS level (sixth year studies) as a pre-university prep class. I've been in love with reptiles since I was 5 or so and made enquiries as to wether I could use reptiles in my studies. My teacher made the relevant enquiries and I was eventually allowed two lovely Ribbon snakes.
The question was what to study. Mammals usually get a lot of attention when it comes to this type of research. Growth rate is widely studied and what intrigued me was a much repeated study of Gerbils and other such rodents that shows increased stimulation through handling promotes rapid growth during the formative period. I was very interested in if this would also apply to snakes.
I had two male ribbons (subspecies were unspecified) for the study (Steve and Dave) who were just past 20cms when they arrived. I studied two things - the aforementioned growth stimulation; and vibration triggers in feeding response.
The growth experiment
Steve was the study subject and Dave acted as the control. Being siblings they were almost identical (although Dave started approx 5mm longer than Steve). The conditions of the experiment were as follows:
Steve and Dave were housed together,
Monday - Friday I measured length and weight,
Food would be weighed and offered on a Fri and weighed again after the snakes had eaten their fill.
Steve would be handled for 1hour every Mon-Fri and Dave would be handled for 5mins.
Results - Within the first 3months Steve had already voided the 5mm difference between himself and Dave. They were both growing like crazy over the months that followed and both showed similar burst of growth but Steve always showed a larger increase in mass and would usually put on an extra 1-2mm more than Dave comparatively.
Steve became more active and inquisitive than Dave.
Dave was more prone to musking.
Steve's growth can be attributed to the extra handling and I believe that the gained mass is a definate result of increased muscle tissue from his 'workout' / increased exercising - length could also be accounted for in my findings as Steve had reached past 50cms by the end of the study and was a full 1.2cms longer than Dave(although I must stress that I only had two test subjects and any difference between them could be genetic or otherwise)
After the experiment I did some measuring and discovered that they both achieved a maximum length that was almost identical (I must stress that after the initial 9months experimention they became my pets and were loved to bits and handled regularily for hours on end
) although
Steve retained his extra body mass and also, eventually had a longer lifespan (though this could also be attributed to any number of other factors external to the experiment)