Like any other adaptation, it was probably just a bizarre sequence of mutations! But dang if it didn't create a masterpiece of a lure!
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Like any other adaptation, it was probably just a bizarre sequence of mutations! But dang if it didn't create a masterpiece of a lure!
It certainly is. But it sure didn't mutate to the current form over night, and on top of that, the snakes had to learn how to use it so convincingly. Thats what I wonder about, how the snake benefited from it in the early stages, in order to get a evolutionary advantage to have time to develope this further until this stage of perfection. Would be really interesting to see how this happened, and how long it took.
It would have to have taken an insanely long time. Most snakes that display caudal luring have a normal tail that, at most, has taken on a different color to attract prey. In order to develop the large bulb and spikes, it would definitely have taken quite a few generations, and likely just started when one snake had a slightly spikier tail. But I think, if I had to wager a guess, that the behavior came first; the tail movements are actually quite similar to other snake species and I think that the spines grew to make the luring even more eye catching.
It is still hard to comprehend how this can happen, all by coincidence. At least it must have taken a very long time, perhaps millions of years. I mean, the snakes previously were also able to survive, so it wouldn't be a must to have this feature in order to survive, just a little advantage.
It would be really helpful to find fossils of snakes with different degrees of developement of this feature. But thats not so easy, I guess.
True, the desert isn't especially conducive to fossilization, so finding the missing links here could prove challenging. But I'll bet there are a few out there is we look hard enough.