Gators & Crocs Use Tools

ScienceShot: First Example of Tool Use in Reptiles:

In what appears to be the first example of tool use among reptiles, researchers have discovered that both animals use twigs and sticks to attract nest-building birds. In 2007, behavioral ecologist Vladimir Dinets noticed that mugger crocodiles (Crocodylus palustris) at a zoo in India would balance small sticks on their snouts near a rookery where egrets compete for sticks to build their nests. Once, one of the crocs lunged at an egret that approached. Intrigued, Dinets studied alligators (Alligator mississippiensis) at four sites in Louisiana. The alligators put sticks on their snouts … much more frequently near egret rookeries and during the nest-building season, he and colleagues report online in Ethology Ecology & Evolution.

Arguably this shows gators and crocs have better sense when it comes to hunting than the NSA, which apparently spent millions of dollars spying on online gamers for fear terrorists might use World of Warcraft or Second Life as meeting sites. It was, for some reason, a very popular assignment all over the TLA world:

Meanwhile, the FBI, CIA, and the Defense Humint Service were all running human intelligence operations – undercover agents – within Second Life. In fact, so crowded were the virtual worlds with staff from the different agencies, that there was a need to try to “deconflict” their efforts – or, in other words, to make sure each agency wasn’t just duplicating what the others were doing.

Sticks would have been cheaper, and about as useful.