Which snake is the smartest?

We've had the "which snake is the scariest," "which snake is the cutest," and "which snake is the weirdest" threads... but now what about which snake is the smartest (if snakes can be said to be smart at all lol).

I'm not even sure how one would quantify "snake intelligence" so I guess this is more a thread for qualitative observations. I'm really curious to hear from people who have kept many different species and would love to know how the personalities and capacity for recognizing people and patterns and solving problems compares between different kinds of snakes. If anyone has any interesting stories please do tell!

I thought I'd make this thread since I have heard some people describe species like the king cobra, rattlesnake, reticulated python, and BCI as more "intellectually present" than other species and I wonder what made them feel that way. Having only kept a BP myself I can't contribute very much (and I'm going to venture that BPs probably would not make it onto the "smartest snakes" list LOL) but I'm very interested in what others have to say.

I've always heard King Cobras show the most intelligence (although unclear how what kind of measurement is involved in making that determination).

Of the species I keep, retics are the smartest. You can almost see their little gears turning when they are looking at things.
The dumbest of what I keep are the ATBs. Just instinct, something moves? bite it and figure it out later! I've had them almost kill themselves from their own stupidity.

Thanks for the input! Yes, I've heard that King Cobras are the kings when it comes to intelligence as well. Apparently it's because they exhibit behaviours that are not seen in any other snakes, such as building nests to lay eggs in. They also appear to have a more advanced ability of understanding what's going on—their keepers report that they can clearly differentiate between feeding, cleaning, and handling time, and can recognize their handlers over other people.

From the videos I've seen, I would also agree that you can practically see the retic gears turning when they are investigating their surroundings.

LOL poor ATBs! At least they're pretty :D

And funnily enough, I've heard the statement from more than one person that "retics are DUMB". I guess it really depends on your snake and what your criteria for intelligence is. I personally would call the king cobra the "smartest" snake, but that could just be because personality in a snake indicates smarts to me, and kings have that in spades. If you love your snakes and they work for you, it doesn't matter how "smart" or "stupid" they are. We gotta love 'em because they're amazing animals!

Great topic- It's hard to say which snakes are the smartest, because just like humans or dogs, not every member of a given species is equally-cognizant. My short answeris rattlesnakes & rat snakes, but it will take some time to explain, & some things, I'm not sure that I should, but in any event I'm busy right now & I'll have to come back to this. ;)

I've never met any King cobras so I cannot offer a personal opinion about them, but there was a lady many years ago who free-handled them & lived relatively unscathed until well into her 60's, when a bite from a small young & newly-acquired cobra (not a King) managed just enough of a bite when she was distracted for an interview, and that's how she died...Grace Olive Wiley under-estimated that deadly little thing, in part because it was too small to get its mouth around her hand (they have fixed fangs, not retractable & longer fangs like rattlesnakes do). Anyway, King cobras are known to have been reliably tamed- Wiley is the one I know most about- & that ability of a snake to recognize & remember a human handler as being no threat & without ever trying to bite is surely a sign of their intelligence.

I would second King Cobras - or maybe elapids in general - somewhere in internet world there are videos of cobras (I think) drinking water from someones' water bottle in the middle of a drought - can't really see a ball python doing that lol

Out of my snakes it would def be the MBK. I've seen her move from one end of her enclosure to the other parallel to her prey and appear to head it off. She really looks like she is anticipating where the mouse is going. It seems different than just laying in wait to ambush her prey like the boas do. She is an absolute eating machine.

I’d say it’s between Woma pythons and Retics :)


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

If the standard for smart = capacity to learn then I'll go with my retics. I have two in enclosures with sliding doors, and I had to buy jeweler's locks for the doors because both figured out they could slide open the doors by scraping along the door from the inside. I watched one do it after putting him back when I thought I left the door open by accident, and when he thought I wasn't looking he did it again.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Spicey

And funnily enough, I've heard the statement from more than one person that "retics are DUMB". I guess it really depends on your snake and what your criteria for intelligence is. I personally would call the king cobra the "smartest" snake, but that could just be because personality in a snake indicates smarts to me, and kings have that in spades. If you love your snakes and they work for you, it doesn't matter how "smart" or "stupid" they are. We gotta love 'em because they're amazing animals!

---

Haha that's fair, I've certainly also seen videos of derpy retics :D And very true, snakes are wonderful pets regardless of whether they're smart or not.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Bogertophis

Great topic- It's hard to say which snakes are the smartest, because just like humans or dogs, not every member of a given species is equally-cognizant. My short answeris rattlesnakes & rat snakes, but it will take some time to explain, & some things, I'm not sure that I should, but in any event I'm busy right now & I'll have to come back to this. ;)

I've never met any King cobras so I cannot offer a personal opinion about them, but there was a lady many years ago who free-handled them & lived relatively unscathed until well into her 60's, when a bite from a small young & newly-acquired cobra (not a King) managed just enough of a bite when she was distracted for an interview, and that's how she died...Grace Olive Wiley under-estimated that deadly little thing, in part because it was too small to get its mouth around her hand (they have fixed fangs, not retractable & longer fangs like rattlesnakes do). Anyway, King cobras are known to have been reliably tamed- Wiley is the one I know most about- & that ability of a snake to recognize & remember a human handler as being no threat & without ever trying to bite is surely a sign of their intelligence.

---

I would love to hear your stories about rattlesnakes and rat snakes! I remember that story you told about one of your rescue rattlesnakes trying to follow you after you released it back into the wild, which was really amazing. I've heard people who work with rattlesnakes for venom extraction also say that rattlesnakes are incredibly intelligent and also harder to work with to extract venom compared to snakes like black mambas because they really understand what's going on.

Wow that story about Wiley is incredible! I'm always amazed to see people free-handling King Cobras. Definitely not something I would dare to do. Sad to hear she passed away :( Accidents can happen easily. It's very common for bites to happen when handling animals during interviews, many people have also been attacked by dogs in similar situations.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by bcr229

If the standard for smart = capacity to learn then I'll go with my retics. I have two in enclosures with sliding doors, and I had to buy jeweler's locks for the doors because both figured out they could slide open the doors by scraping along the door from the inside. I watched one do it after putting him back when I thought I left the door open by accident, and when he thought I wasn't looking he did it again.

---

Sounds like you have some very mischievous retics! :D I'm impressed they figured out how to open sliding doors without hands haha.

Measuring a snakes smarts is pretty tough. I'd say that the most active or responsive to stimuli are going to appear the smartest but who knows maybe that bp that sits like a munk has some stuff going on upstairs. ;)

My current enclosures are 8 feet long with two doors. I used to place cardboard on the end opposite the critter before feeding. I would toss the rat on the cardboard. After doing this many times I noticed the boas would get into eating mode as soon as I put the cardboard in the enclosure. Since I was reusing the cardboard I thought maybe the retained scent was setting them off. (I used to breed rats in the basement...I noticed just going in the basement without touching anything and then going in the snake room carried enough retained scent that only a masochist would try to interact with the boas right after being in the basement.)

So I decided I would try virgin cardboard to eliminate retained scent and do this before having any contact with the rats. Just placing virgin cardboard in the enclosure resulted in the boas being ready to eat. BCO had the strongest reaction which I correlate to them being absolutely fearless and they were always the first to the carboard before the test.

IMO they clearly formed an association. Was it the smell of cardboard or the process? I don't know. It makes sense to me that smell would be a good thing for them to make an association with...spring flowers would bring critters. So a flowering bush or tree smell might make a boa hang out and wait. We also know boas and carpet pythons will return to a cave entrance to catch bats. I wish I could find it again but I remember reading about a boa that had a tracking device placed in it and was then placed some distance from where it was caught. It returned to location it was caught.

Smart isn't a descriptor I like to use on snakes but they have been here a very long time and even though they have a brain the size of a pea, there is still a brain. Then again, look at humans...a huge brain and we are still morons. :rofl:

"If a lion could speak, we could not understand him" -Wittgenstein
Snake do not think or process information the way humans do. There is no shared "reference" when referring to "smarts", because their experience, psycho-physiology, and mere existance is so far removed from ours, we couldn't comprehend it any more than they could comprehend ours.

How do we define smart? All snakes will escape their enclosures if they get the chance. Most will grow obese if given enough food. And all have different defense mechanisms they employ when they feel threatened (to varying effect). If that's how you judge smarts, Ball Pythons are pretty stupid in curling up in a ball, and spitting cobras are pretty smart for spitting venom at your eyes. I've heard king cobras are the "smartest", but anyone who keeps a king cobra as a pet is a pretty stupid human. So who can say?

I've heard from people that milk hots, the King Cobra is one of the smartest.

I've also heard the black mamba is no slouch either.

I will say Womas are incredible alert say compared to my ball python and boas.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by bns

...Smart isn't a descriptor I like to use on snakes but they have been here a very long time and even though they have a brain the size of a pea, there is still a brain. Then again, look at humans...a huge brain and we are still morons. :rofl:

---

One thing to consider when talking about "brain size" (& which makes it hard to compare species for intelligence) is that snakes don't have all these arms & legs that their brain has to control, or the ability to hear or talk, so you can't just go by brain size without considering how they function.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Bogertophis

One thing to consider when talking about "brain size" (& which makes it hard to compare species for intelligence) is that snakes don't have all these arms & legs that their brain has to control, or the ability to hear or talk, so you can't just go by brain size without considering how they function.

---

Interesting that you read what I posted and came away with that ^. :gj:

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by bns

My current enclosures are 8 feet long with two doors. I used to place cardboard on the end opposite the critter before feeding. I would toss the rat on the cardboard. After doing this many times I noticed the boas would get into eating mode as soon as I put the cardboard in the enclosure. Since I was reusing the cardboard I thought maybe the retained scent was setting them off. (I used to breed rats in the basement...I noticed just going in the basement without touching anything and then going in the snake room carried enough retained scent that only a masochist would try to interact with the boas right after being in the basement.)

So I decided I would try virgin cardboard to eliminate retained scent and do this before having any contact with the rats. Just placing virgin cardboard in the enclosure resulted in the boas being ready to eat. BCO had the strongest reaction which I correlate to them being absolutely fearless and they were always the first to the carboard before the test.

---

These are some interesting observations! I feed my BP on cardboard as well in his enclosure. I put it down in front of his hide and he sticks his head and neck out onto it in an "S" shape. He seems to know that cardboard means food is for sure on the way, and he also seems to have learned to associate the vibrations of someone walking up and down the stairs to the basement (which are right next to my room where I keep my BP) with the imminent arrival of a rat since I keep the frozen rats in a freezer in the basement. Either of those two things is pretty much guaranteed to put him in food mode!

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Luvyna

These are some interesting observations! I feed my BP on cardboard as well in his enclosure. I put it down in front of his hide and he sticks his head and neck out onto it in an "S" shape. He seems to know that cardboard means food is for sure on the way, and he also seems to have learned to associate the vibrations of someone walking up and down the stairs to the basement (which are right next to my room where I keep my BP) with the imminent arrival of a rat since I keep the frozen rats in a freezer in the basement. Either of those two things is pretty much guaranteed to put him in food mode!

---

I recall someone on another forum that always fed her boa on sheets of newspaper (which is not a great idea, as it can be swallowed if it gets damp & sticks to the rodents). Anyway, much like your snake with the cardboard, her snake associated the newspaper with being fed & got pretty "enthused", apparently without fail. Snakes clearly do learn to associate things that matter to them...& that's also why most learn to associate US with safety (or lack of harm, at least) & don't have to be re-tamed every time we pick them up.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Bogertophis

I recall someone on another forum that always fed her boa on sheets of newspaper (which is not a great idea, as it can be swallowed if it gets damp & sticks to the rodents). Anyway, much like your snake with the cardboard, her snake associated the newspaper with being fed & got pretty "enthused", apparently without fail. Snakes clearly do learn to associate things that matter to them...& that's also why most learn to associate US with safety (or lack of harm, at least) & don't have to be re-tamed every time we pick them up.

---

The cardboard or newspaper is like Pavlov's bell for them haha :D

I find it so cute that snakes can learn to associate humans with security. It's strangely flattering when you hand a snake to a stranger and it tries to come back to you.