The fox behaviour study started from wild animals, completely fresh. They aren't at all related to domestic dogs. Go out and get a wild cat, raise it by hand and see how it compares to a domestic cat! Even with most of the genetic variation in domestic cats gone, once they go feral, they are (naturally) selected to have natural (fierce, fearful etc) behaviour and raising a kitten by hand, collected from a long term feral cat population will give a very different animal from your regular tame pussy cat (which is still equally obnoxious of course!). If it was true that animals becoming tame over successive generations was simply because of their environmental influences (that is, they're in captivity, becoming used to people etc etc) then selected lines would be no different from randomly selected lines. This has been demonstrated time and again not to be the case. Scientists are very familiar with the concept of confounding variables and that is exactly why they have controls (replicates without treatments) in their experiments. Unless they had simultaneously bred non selected lines in identical conditions along with the selected lines, then seen a difference between them, they couldn't have made the claims they make. If selection had no affect, this would have been demonstrated time and again, with real, tangible, practical experiments.
The fox example is a mammal, yes, but the exact same principle applies to any animal. Countless studies have been carried out, of course, many have been done on rats and mice, but some on other biological groups. Reptiles may be simpler than mammals, but fish and even insect behaviour can and has been selected for! Yes, instinct is a very big part of reptile behaviour, I don't think anyone here is enough of a moron not to realise that, but stop for a moment and consider that instincts are patterns of behaviour... which are ***genetically determined***! Instinct is very, very clearly something you can select for and alter in a line of animals, whatever the type, as is any genetic trait for which variation exists.
As for the suggestion that these concepts are merely 'theory', well, they are based on short and long term experiments, carried out on real animals, by real people in many many real cases. No one here has proper experience running behavioural selection experiments on snakes, it is completely stupid to suggest that the people claiming it is impossible have had experience with it, because no one so sure about it not working would spend many years working with a group of dozens of pairs of animals selecting for temperament.
Rob, I'm not trying to suggest that we should blindly believe what Southern X reptiles says is true, just that people seem to believe anything that is said, and being pretty popular around here I'd have thought people would irrationally have taken their word as gospel. Having said that, Dr Stone is a highly educated biologist and I'd generally be inclined to take him seriously. As for the way he gets them to let go (it's alcohol and water he uses, not bleach) I'm not too fond of the idea either! Bites don't just come from nasty snakes, they can come from hungry snakes which smell food and I greatly doubt he uses this technique often at all. I have never considered using the method and wouldn't recommend it, but he and many others like it and no doubt he is right about it working.
As for the fraudulent use of the terms, yes, I agree, this happens, it is deplorable.
As for the tangent of caudal luring, I have seen literally dozens of captive womas which will frantically 'lure' at every feed, and yes, 'jump up and down' too (very cute!). I also question how much this is functional luring and how much is just 'excitement' or distraction. This was discussed in another thread a few days ago, as I said in it, and others have said here, they don't undulate their tails as do other pythons, they flick them. It's difficult to imagine them doing it simply because they're excited because it's such an outwardly obvious thing to do, which suggests it would have some function, but I agree, we really don't know.
Millions of dollars go into scientific research, much of it is payed for by us, the taxpayers, so that it can benefit us. We are all lucky to have all this scientific information available to us, yet for some reason, reptile people seem to want to create their own version of genetics, while largely ignoring the data which exists. It took the lifelong dedication of many genetecists and a great deal of resources to get to where they are, we can't expect to do a better job by making a few observations, making unfounded claims and relaying rumours. Anyone who doubts any of this should feel very free to read as much of the scientific literature as they want, you paid for it, it's there for you!
Serpenttongue, years ago I saw that video, the hatchling carpet luring was the thing which stuck in my mind most clearly (the ending with the cat in the snake's belly stands out too
), as at the time I'd never seen a carpet lure and didn't know they did it
