I have been observing social behaviour in captivity for a couple years.
Its difficult to determine if there is any bonding in captivity, as the animals have no choice but to live together, Are they just tolerant of one another?? in the wild, that is an amazing find!!!
And they will MARK TERRITORY with poo, more on that later.
Captivity and wild are apples and oranges apart, yet still fascinating to observe.
There are 3 hides in one tank, 3 dekay browns and 2 garters. There was a red belly snake, I let her go, she was not liking the captivity, and it showed. I felt it would be cruel to force this snake to stay my pet, when it spent more time turning down food, freaking out in the tank and just seemed non content.
The 2 garters almost always chose to hide together, as the 3 dekays do the same. Sometimes I will find one garter coiled up with a dekay in the same spiral.
They MUST be taken out and fed one at a time, or they will brawl violently over one single food item, even if there is enough food to feed an army, they all decide they want the same one!!
A snake that is otherwise unwilling to eat, will sometimes immediately scoot right over and grab onto the food that is already in another snakes mouth, while ignoring all the other food in the cage.
Can they identify siblings? Obviously so. Can they identify their own kids, I wholeheartedly believe so, Xena's litter was kept in quarantine as they grew, as an experiment, when they were a bit bigger, I placed a few babies in the tank. Shortly I observed Xena coiled up with her babies, and no other snake in that cage.
AFTER WEEKS of separation, removed a neonate, and returned with a juvenile. And she apparently recognized the babies?
Regards,
Wayne
