Aggression leads to shorter lifespans in kukri snakes native to Orchid Island (Lanyu, 蘭嶼), according to a study published in the Washington-based online journal Science Advances on April 24.
In vertebrates, such as lions, males express territorial behavior more often than females, Huang Wen-san (黃文山), director of the National Museum of Natural Science’s Biology Department and one of the authors of the study, said on April 29.
However, when female kukri snakes, or Oligodon formosanus, find sea turtle eggs, which the snakes eat, they will defend the territory to keep the eggs to themselves, Huang said.
Photo: Su Meng-chuan, Taipei Times
Even if other snakes — male or female — are already at the nesting site, the female will attack them, he said.
As a result, the females have injury rates of about two times that of males, he said.
As wounds often become infected, the females’ survival rates and lifespans are affected, he said.
In 2000, when kukri snakes at Orchid Island’s Siaobadai (小八代) and Dongcing (東清) bays had access to turtle eggs, the females showed high rates of injury, while survival rates and lifespans among males were higher, said Huang, who has been studying the species at the sites since 1997.
On average, the lifespan of female kukris was only about one-third that of males, he said.
In 2001, Dongcing Bay was significantly desanded by a typhoon, reducing the number of sea turtle eggs laid at the site, he said.
Thereafter, female kukris in the area no longer exhibited territorial behavior, while the difference in lifespan between females and males was no longer obvious, he said.
However, the intersexual difference in survival persisted at Siaobadai, where eggs remained available, Huang said.
Female kukri snakes raised in a lab that did not have to defend territory also did not display differences in average lifespan from males, he said.
In other animals, males often have shorter lifespans than females, because it is usually the males that express territorial behavior and fight more, he said.
However, this study suggests that there are other reasons for differences in lifespan beyond sex, Huang said.
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