The Effects of Temperature on the Kinematics of Rattlesnake Predatory Strikes in Both Captive and Field Environments.

ABSTRACT: The outcomes of predator-prey interactions between endotherms and ectotherms can be heavily influenced by environmental temperature, owing to the difference in how body temperature affects locomotor performance. However, as elastic energy storage mechanisms can allow ectotherms to maintain high levels of performance at cooler body temperatures, detailed analyses of kinematics are necessary to fully understand how changes in temperature might alter endotherm-ectotherm predator-prey interactions. Viperid snakes are widely distributed ectothermic mesopredators that interact with endotherms both as predator and prey. Although there are numerous studies on the kinematics of viper strikes, surprisingly few have analyzed how this rapid movement is affected by temperature. Here we studied the effe

SUBMITTER: Whitford MD 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7671150 | biostudies-literature | 2020

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature