Tips, Examples, Viewer Questions: Choice-Based Handling

Rodney is joined by a few other snakes (TC, Radek, Barclay) as I answer a couple of questions regarding Choice-Based Handling, show you some examples, and introduce the concept of Approach & Retreat.
Approach the animal until they exhibited fear, anxiety, or distress and then stop and retreat. When the animal is comfortable and relaxed again, approach and continue until signs of fear, anxiety, and distress emerge again, and then back off and retreat again. Continue this back and forth with your snake until the are remaining comfortable and relaxed more and more, the fear threshold will get higher and the flight zone/distance will decrease. Depending on the snake this process may happen quickly or over a long period of time and many sessions.

www.BehaviorEducation.org

Burger, J., & Gochfeld, M. (1990). Risk discrimination of direct versus tangential approach by basking black iguanas (Ctenosaura similis): variation as a function of human exposure. Journal of Comparative Psychology, 104(4), 388.

Farrand, A., Hosey, G., & Buchanan-Smith, H. M. (2014). The visitor effect in petting zoo-housed animals: Aversive or enriching?. Applied Animal Behaviour Science, 151, 117-127.

Anderson, U. S., Benne, M., Bloomsmith, M. A., & Maple, T. L. (2002). Retreat space and human visitor density moderate undesirable behavior in petting zoo animals. Journal of Applied Animal Welfare Science, 5(2), 125-137.