Training Tuesday: Let’s Discuss Royal Pythons

[@charleneleske3077]

This is so interesting because I definitely saw a decrease in accuracy with my royal when he was around 1.5 years old but he improved again and is now extremely accurate and i'm wondering if that improvement coincided with his change in feeding schedule!

[@af7409]

It does not make logical sense that their strike efficacy would decline with age. It absolutely makes sense that their motivation might decline under conditions of being over fed.

[@LoriTorrini]

@@af7409 The researcher was very thorough and in all the subjects studies strike performance declined over the 3 years of testing. The paper is very Intersting and I encourage you to read it thoroughly.

[@lexsdragon1554]

@@LoriTorrini Lori, could you please share a feeding chart you think is accurate?

[@LoriTorrini]

@@lexsdragon1554 I do behavior based feeding so no charts, no schedule. I have two videos about this though. Just search my channel for Behavior-Based Feeding.

[@honeybeeart9382]

Hmmm, I wonder if when their strike efficiency declines, if there is a particular food item being abundantly during a particular season, available so they've evolved to direct their energy elsewhere? Animals do evolve to suite their environment, but I don't know if this would be an example of it? However, I believe that we DO overfeed them, as I've read it takes them 4-5 years to mature in the wild and often 2-3 in captivity. I think royal pythons are far more intelligent than people give them credit for and often their "dumb pet rock" persona comes from the snake's apathy or disinterest in pleasing humans, not lack of intelligence. They are very cat like in that regard.