Quote:
Originally Posted by bcr226
Do snakes have emotions? I believe they do. They may not be able to convey their emotions with us in a manner we understand but let's look at a few points.
1. It has been proven that snakes have memory. Tests show that snakes can recognize duplicate structure on sight without input from smell.
2. Snakes are curious animals. They will investigate new things and explore things unknown to them. I see this if I change up or add something to any of our enclosures.
3. Snakes process information. It may be basic information but they do it and they learn from it. Case in point, teaching a snake to recognize rats as food over mice.
Some of our snakes react differently to different people in a consistent manner. One of our ball pythons will curl up under my shirt and stay there for hours while this same one will constantly cruise around on my wife trying to get into trouble. This shows at least to a minor degree a level of recognition of different people.
So, the basis of developing emotions is certainly there. Are they there? I only have my own observations which can be interpreted in various ways.
Our BCI breeding pair definitely have a bond of some degree. The male does not like the female being out of his sight. He will actively look for her until he can see her again. He'll become tense and agitated, not aggressive in any way but there is definitely a change in posture and stress. When he sees her, he relaxes.
But, that's observation. How does one test for emotion outside of observation?
No matter what, we're dealing with base level intelligence and mental activity. We know that most if not all animals have at least one emotion which is fear. How do we identify other emotions?
I'm game to experiment on this with the caveat that I will not harm or intentionally cause fear in any of the test subjects. But again, how do you test for it?
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1. Where's the report?
2. Great. Your animals are leading causes and is a definite source for all animals in captivity.
3. Actually, we don't do that. They will eat both animals. It isn't one over the other. We don't teach them anything. We just get them to eat what we're offering because it's simple prey for us to use.
Snakes easily recognize things we don't. Confidence,fear or whatever may be underlining and that would cause for concern. I'd venture to say they are less comfortable because they use your shirt as a hide to hide from the world (stress in my opinion) and two, if it's cruising looking "for trouble" then it could be trying to escape.
Observe? Yes that's how you learn. You have yet to truly observe though. You presume your boas have a bond due to a 5 or 10 minute experience of "lost" between the two snakes. Have you housed them completely the same but in different enclosures and see how they behave over a week? 4 weeks? 4 months?
You have this caveat but with it you believe separating the boas to be harmful to their psyche or fearful of separation so you're only left with what you deem as a bond.
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