Who doesn't like to brag about their retic's intelligence?
Since acquiring my retic Mango I've observed her ability to problem solve. My other snakes (including my other retic) have not shown this behavior to her extent. One of her favorite past times is trying to escape her enclosure. And she's pretty damn good at it.
Since I've put her into a lockable Vision cage I've noticed how she goes about trying to escape and here are some observations:
- She completely ignores the rivited vents as a mode of escape, despite being familiar with possible escape from above from her previous glass terrarium.
- What she does focus on is the glass sliding doors, particularly the point where the doors overlap in the middle. She tries to squeeze between them. She is very focused on this idea.
- After this not working for some time, she changes strategy to investigate the whole surface of the door by rubbing her head over it. She then reverts to the previous behavior of trying to squeeze between the panes but more forcefully.
- Later she tries to force her way through the door tract, then went back to running her head over the glass doors.
- This process repeats as one strategy fails, she investigates, and tries something else or modifies a previous attempt. Very interesting to observe as she spends a great deal of energy on this and her actions do not appear random, but very intentional.
- This goes on for a long time. She sometimes takes breaks between failed attempts and appears to be what some might call frustrated.
- She is more likely to engage in this behavior when on an empty stomach. Least so during shed and sometimes on a full belly.
What have you guys observed in your retic's intelligence?
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