Scientists were surprised to learn in a recent study that snakes get calmed during stress in the same way humans do…by being around their companions. Scientists have dubbed this phenomenon “Social Buffering”, which means having companions around can reduce biological responses to stress. The current study is the first to document the phenomenon in snakes.*
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Backstory
The research team regularly removes rattlesnakes for homeowners and so spend a lot of time driving around with snakes in buckets in the back of their vehicles. One of the scientists noticed that when he had two snakes in a bucket together as he was driving down the mountain that they seemed to rattle less or not rattle at all — as opposed to if he just had one snake in the bucket. Rattlesnakes are cryptically social, exhibiting kin recognition and forming subtle social networks in certain contexts. The researchers decided to design a study to measure whether social buffering was at play to calm the snakes during stressful situations. (source)
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Study overview
Researchers used 25 Southern Pacific rattlesnakes captured from the wild, including some that came from lowland areas and others from the mountains. They placed the snakes in 19-liter plastic buckets, then sealed off and struck the containers with pipes to simulate a stressful environment. They used an over-the-counter heart rate monitor to track the animals’ stress levels while testing the subjects in three ways: alone, with a companion, and with a rope about the same size as a fellow snake (to ensure that the presence of another snake, and not just another object, was causing the reduced stress response).
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Results overview
Scientists found that the snakes’ heart rates were substantially reduced when they were placed in the bucket with a companion compared with being alone or with the rope. And that result held true for both the lowland and mountain-dwelling snakes as well as males and females.
These findings could have broad implications not only for Pacific rattlesnakes but also for reptiles in general.
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* Social buffering has been observed previously in scientific studies of humans, rodents, birds and nonhuman primates.
Journal reference: Martin, C., Fox, G., Putman, B. & Hayes, W. Social security: can rattlesnakes reduce acute stress through social buffering? Frontiers in Ethology, 06 July 2023, Sec. Social Behavior and Communication,Volume 2 – 2023 | https://doi.org/10.3389/fetho.2023.1181774
Ian
FIREPAW, Inc. 