With nearly 3,000 species of snakes in the world, there must be a variety of hunting methods among them, but one segment of snakes has a particularly interesting way of eating a meal.
They use their tails as bait.
This technique is called caudal lure.
It is a form of aggressive mimicry when a species uses part of its body to mimic the prey of the same animals it preys on.
The most accessible part of a snake's body is at the ends of their tails.
What can snakes imitate
Some snakes use their tails to look like worms, luring lizards close enough for the snakes to strike them, others use their tails to look like spiders to lure
birds closer, and some species of snakes are even suspected of using their tails to lure insectivorous mammals like mice The desert sand viper, for example, uses its tail to mimic grubs.
The desert sand viper buries its body in the sand, leaving only its nostrils and eyes above the surface.
And when a lizard approaches, its distinctive tail protrudes above the surface and wriggles in the manner of an insect caterpillar, and the lizards that try to
grab the tail are hit by the snake and eaten, unlike many other species of snakes that practice caudal lure only as young, and one of the types of snakes that really shows how similar the tail is to a lizard Insect is the southern death rattlesnake.
What snakes use tail lure
Caudal lure is documented most often among pythons and pit vipers, but has also been seen in boas, pythons, and other species of snakes.
It is believed that caudal lure increases the number of encounters with prey, and thus increases the odds of catching something for dinner.
Young snakes that hunt small, insect-eating prey, this behavior fades as they get older and shift to mammalian prey species that don't care much about
wriggling insects, however, researchers are still studying the behavior, and it has been seen in adults, but when adults do, it It raises questions, do snakes lure prey or do something else.
The caudal snake lure is a controversial theory
One of the main challenges of studying tail baiting in snakes is simply trying to figure out the uses among different species, and identifying the difference between tail wiggling for lure purposes against a
range of other possible explanations, from defense or distraction to communication with potential mates, and knowing the exact reason snakes wriggle their tails.
It is key to understanding the behavior and uses of different types of snakes.
Some scientists suggest that caudal lure in snakes is at the root of how rattlesnakes acquired their noisy tails, with the shift from adults using flashing tail motion However, this is a controversial theory.
Only one species of rattlesnake has been seen to use its tail as a lure as an adult, the pygmy dark rattlesnake, and the only rattlesnake known to use its tail for both prey capture and defense in adulthood is the dwarf dark rattlesnake.
This species has the smallest rattlesnake in comparison to the size of all rattlesnakes, and 50% of adults in a typical population cannot produce enough rattles because of their small rattles, so these rattlesnakes may
be similar to what their ancestors of the rattlesnake might have looked like, with So, we don't know for sure and debate continues about how and why crackles evolved.
Evidence that caudal lure in snakes is a hunting technique
At the same time, it is very clear that a species of tailed snake has evolved to use it as a lure that is finally depicted successfully capturing prey through the tailed lure, spider-tailed snakes have a tail
remarkably similar to a fat spider, and the spider-tailed lure is a form of mimicry that they use Snakes to deceive and lure unsuspecting prey within striking range, other snakes have a caudal lure, but none can boast of a spider-like appearance.
In this case, the bait consists of soft tissue that is quite different from the keratin tails of a rattlesnake, for example.
The swelling creates a spider's body, and the elongated scales around this create the illusion of spider legs. Snakes use the spider's tail lure to attract birds, and it's interesting.
It's a trick that local birds don't like, and it's birds that migrate through the area that tend to fall for the bait.
Whether it's a tail that moves like a worm, or a tail surprisingly spider-like, many species of snakes take advantage of the tailed lure tactic to get their next meal.