Contextually conspicuous species are more likely to be venomous: Habitat‐dependent aposematic colouration found throughout snakes
- 1Zoology Department, School of Natural Sciences University of Galway Galway Ireland
Abstract
Many animals use conspicuous colours to advertise their unprofitability to potential predators, a phenomenon known as aposematism. For example, conspicuous banded patterns in snakes are often highlighted as aposematic signalling of their venomous nature. However, aposematic colouration needs to be analysed while considering a species' environmental context, seen as species which seem conspicuous in isolation may be well camouflaged within their natural environment.
Here, we collate images for 458 snake species from iNaturalist and use a novel metric quantifying the degree of conspicuousness of each species compared with its natural context to test the relationship between conspicuousness and the presence, potency and defensive properties of venom.
We find that venomous species are significantly more contextually conspicuous compared with non‐venomous species. However, while these results provide support for the link between the evolution of aposematism in relation to venom, we do not find an association with the potency or the pain‐inducing capacity of venoms with the data used in this study, indicating that these traits may not be important drivers of the evolution of aposematism in snakes.
Our novel approach demonstrates how incorporating the environmental context of a species can shed light on our understanding of the evolution of conspicuous colouration.
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BibTeX
@article{duclaux2026contextually,
title = {{Contextually conspicuous species are more likely to be venomous: Habitat‐dependent aposematic colouration found throughout snakes}},
author = {Amy Duclaux and Michel Dugon and Kevin Healy},
journal = {The Journal of Animal Ecology},
year = {2026},
month = oct,
doi = {10.1111/1365-2656.70351},
url = {https://doi.org/10.1111/1365-2656.70351},
note = {CC BY 4.0},
}
RIS
TY - JOUR
TI - Contextually conspicuous species are more likely to be venomous: Habitat‐dependent aposematic colouration found throughout snakes
AU - Amy Duclaux
AU - Michel Dugon
AU - Kevin Healy
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/10/04
JO - The Journal of Animal Ecology
DO - 10.1111/1365-2656.70351
UR - https://doi.org/10.1111/1365-2656.70351
AB - Many animals use conspicuous colours to advertise their unprofitability to potential predators, a phenomenon known as aposematism. For example, conspicuous banded patterns in snakes are often highlighted as aposematic signalling of their venomous nature. However, aposematic colouration needs to be analysed while considering a species' environmental context, seen as species which seem conspicuous in isolation may be well camouflaged within their natural environment. Here, we collate images for 458 snake species from iNaturalist and use a novel metric quantifying the degree of conspicuousness of each species compared with its natural context to test the relationship between conspicuousness and the presence, potency and defensive properties of venom. We find that venomous species are significantly more contextually conspicuous compared with non‐venomous species. However, while these results provide support for the link between the evolution of aposematism in relation to venom, we do not find an association with the potency or the pain‐inducing capacity of venoms with the data used in this study, indicating that these traits may not be important drivers of the evolution of aposematism in snakes. Our novel approach demonstrates how incorporating the environmental context of a species can shed light on our understanding of the evolution of conspicuous colouration.
SN - 0021-8790
SN - 1365-2656
ER -