Tweeters,


I was recently reading material about Western and Eastern Screech Owls in the Cornell- BOL -site. Always interesting summaries and reviews of the research regarding birds.


I offer the following quote, from Cornell regarding Eastern Screech owls:


"Symbioses


In central Texas, M. a. hasbrouckii deliver live blind snakes ( Leptotyphlops dulcis ) to nests. Rarely eaten, sequestered in owl nest debris, the snakes eat ant and fly larvae and pupae, reduce insect competition for cached food, and contribute to breeding success ( Gehlbach and Baldridge 1987 , Gehlbach 1994c ). Acrobat ant ( Crematogaster lineolata ) colonies in same nest debris do not bother owls directly but eat or export cached food; they swarm human intruders (bite, spray repellent secretions), presumably protecting their own nesting effort and, inadvertently, the owls."

I ask you: How would that behavior have originally begun?

Dan Reiff

On a different subject: Maybe that Ecuadorian woodpecker in the video picked the wrong snake or it grew-up (I am kidding about the woodpecker).