Evidence suggests that snakes can hear, but how they naturally respond to sound is still unclear. Scientists from the University of Queensland, Australian Reptile Academy, and the Queensland University of Technology conducted a series of controlled experiment trials on 19 snakes across five genera in a sound-proof room, observing the effects of three sounds on individual snake behavior, compared to controls. They quantified eight snake behaviors — body movement, body freezing, head-flicks, tongue-flicks, hissing, periscoping, head fixation, lower jaw drop — in response to the sounds.
“Because snakes don’t have external ears, people typically think they’re deaf and can only feel vibrations through the ground and into their bodies,” said lead author Dr. Christina Zdenek, a researcher in the Venom Evolution Lab at the University of Queensland.
“But our research – the first of its kind using non-anesthetized, freely moving snakes – found they do react to soundwaves traveling through the air, and possibly human voices.”
The study involved 19 snakes, representing five genetic families of reptile: an ambush elapid (Acanthophis), an active python (Aspidites), an arboreal elapid (Hoplocephalus) and two active elapids (Oxyuranus and Pseudonaja).
“We played one sound which produced ground vibrations, while the other two were airborne only,” Dr. Zdenek said.
“It meant we were able to test both types of ‘hearing’ — tactile hearing through the snakes’ belly scales and airborne through their internal ear.”
The reactions strongly depended on the genus of the snakes.
“Only the woma python tended to move toward sound, while taipans, brown snakes and especially death adders were all more likely to move away from it,” Dr. Zdenek said.
“The types of behavioral reactions also differed, with taipans in particular more likely to exhibit defensive and cautious responses to…
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