Social behaviour in snakes

[Stefan-A]

Maybe there's a pheromone they emit to "page" other garters on the presence of food... Like I stated, collaborative effort to keep the species alive. This is entirely possible. When I was at the international science fair I talked to a girl who did her project on collaborative digestion of food particles by fruit fly larvae. Turns out, they all spit on the food so everyone can eat it.

I don't have the opportunity to verify that that's why the larvae are doing it, but that would be kin selection. (Kin selection - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia) Doesn't really apply to this case, since you can't assume that the snakes they're with are closely related or even of the same species.

[Zephyr]

I don't have the opportunity to verify that that's why the larvae are doing it, but that would be kin selection. (Kin selection - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia) Doesn't really apply to this case, since you can't assume that the snakes they're with are closely related or even of the same species.

Might apply to my area... I've observed signs of a genetic bottleneck that may have occurred around 40 or 50 years ago. That would mean that most of the garters would be somewhat related... Oi, this makes my head hurt. x.x