Meeting Abstract
Until recently, only a few studies quantified striking performance in snakes. Aside from fleeing predators, snakes use defensive strikes to evade capture. Ratsnakes are semi-arboreal snakes that must dispel predators in both terrestrial and arboreal environments. We measured defensive terrestrial and arboreal strikes to determine if snakes modulate their strike performance relative to the habitat they occupy. To determine the scaling of striking performance, snakes were measured from an ontogenetic range of body sizes. We are still analyzing the effects of body size on strike performance, but in paired analyses terrestrial strikes were significantly higher in maximum velocity, strike duration, and strike distance than perched strikes (p < 0.01 for all). Performance of snakes in arboreal habitats is likely confounded by the need to use a portion of the posterior part of the body to maintain contact with limbs and prevent falling.
