Insights into the secretive behavior of rattlesnakes through the lenses of personality, optimal foraging, and crypsis
Da Cunha, Océane
Department of Biological Sciences
The University of Texas at El Paso
El Paso, Texas USA
Many aspects of the behavioral ecology of rattlesnakes remain unexplored, especially in field settings, resulting in significant gaps in our understanding of their life-history. Advances in behavioral ecology and the development of new techniques allow new questions to be answered about rattlesnakes. This presentation will focus on three such questions: 1) Why do individual rattlesnakes differ in movement patterns? 2) How do rattlesnakes navigate the landscape of fear to optimize foraging? And 3) Why are rattlesnakes so cryptic? To answer these questions, I radiotracked Crotalus atrox in West Texas and collected a variety of data using different tools. Personality, particularly boldness, was related to the difference in movement between individual Crotalus atrox, but only during the non-mating season, suggesting the existence of two foraging strategies. Yet, all rattlesnakes chose to be active when and where the probability of prey encounter was significantly higher than the probability of detection by predators, thus following optimal foraging theory. However, they did not completely avoid predators, maybe due to their ability to blend in so well with their surroundings by behaviorally enhancing their crypsis. These results reveal just how much remains to be uncovered about the fascinating behavioral ecology of rattlesnakes.