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Posted by Fred Albury on October 10, 2002 at 23:23:50:
In Reply to: Let's put our thinking caps on. posted by A.C. on October 10, 2002 at 00:42:16:
:Here is a question by one of my college prof's that got me thinking. This was in response to my detailing of the trials and tribulations ass. with indigo breeding. Here are some questions for those with answers. Great brain candy!
:1. What is the biological advantage of a male indigo ripping apart his female mate to the point where she is dead or near death? How does this help the spp?
:2.Are there any valid reports of this occurrence in the wild?
:3. Have we, captive breeders, bred these snakes like pitbulls with the meanest snakes siring our females to produce a meaner and meaner generation of males?
:We can certainly see sexual dimorphism. Basically in layman's terms, males are bigger in x species because x females only mate with the biggest strongest males. This makes the next generation of males evern larger and so on. We see this in humans (can be linked to ancient ancestry), couperi, birds like boat tailed grackles, and many more.
:Do I know these answers? No. However, I would love to see what everyone thinks on the issue.
*First of all I would like to state that these are just my observations from keeping/breeding these snakes for the last 12 years or so.*
#1. I truly believe that in the captive conditons in which we maintain Eastern Indigos, their behaviour is altered radically from that of their wild caught cohorts. We put an *Active, diurnal snake* in a cage that is usally no larger than 6 ft in length, limit its food choices to mice and rats, and the occasional chick thrown in for good measure and provide no u.v. lighting.
What I am trying to get at is the conditons we keep them in, the close quarters, the singular diets, and the often Yearly breeding attempts all have to be artificial in nature.
As such, it seems that these conditons would also alter their patterns of in relation to each other radically.
I have had Eastern Males become VERY aggressive with the females once they were introduced dureing breeding, tearing scales right of the dorsal surface and biting the females neck so hard that scales were torn off and lacerations became evident. This occured in males that were the same size or slightly smaller than the females that were used. My largest males(Cadillac & Scarface) never have exhibited this behaviour, preferring to instead use their sheer body weight and size to pin the females.
They have never rsorted to the use of the type of force you mention and have had excellent reproductive records to boot.
I do not think that we are "line breeding" a strain of Couperi that are more aggresive than their forefathers, I think they vary as individuals.
*I DO* think that , because of the focus on reproduceing red chinned couperi and the largest, most robust black couperi, that because of father to daughter and sibling to sibling breedings that occur, that we are beginning to see a much weaker animal than their wild caught congners. Just my opinion.
I have a female couperi, who has bitten me twice, opened me up like a tin can both times.Now..I have rule about snakes in my house, if it bites me once and I dont REALLY like it that much..it is GONE. This is irregardless of whatever $$ I might make off of its potential offspring. It is a knee jerk reaction akin to grabbing the snake and breaking its neck for biting me. Minus the neck breaking of course...
Now this particular female bit me not once...but twice and opened me up both times. So, I am at a juncture, do I stick by my policy of weeding out the "bad actors" from my collection, or do I use her as a breeder again, as she has produced some truly *Stellar* all black young easterns for me in the past?
Additonally, one of her offspring exhibits nervous attitudes and aggresion also(Held him back for myself in 2000) and out of the whole clutch, he is the only one that is not running on all eight cyclinders...a chip off the old block. lol
Closeing arguements:
I dont think that we breed for the biggest males, as a good portion of the easterns that are bred are large simply because they were exposed to copious amounts of food that would cause any eastern to grow large. I DO think we breed for color which in my opinion is a huge mistake, though I understand it from an economic standpoint and an interest one.
This issue is very interesting and I hope that others comment on it. It deserves more input and feedback from those here, definetly.
Additonally, I have a Pitt Bull, the irrepressible "Buddha"m, and frankly, what has been done with that type of dog is a shame. They are game dogs and are bred for the pitt, to be sure, but they have become a symbol and vehicle for those in our5 society to assert their own misplaced aggression, and pride themselves on the captive reproduction and line breeding of Pitts that are dog to human aggressive instead of dog to dog.
There quite a few truly good Pitt bloodlines out there, most of which I wouldnt trust with my lab, but that would definetly attack a person. They are what we make them into. And we always manipulate nature for our own greedy and selfish ambitons. always.
Fred Albury
AZTEC REPTILES
