Coral snake serves as a ______ in mimicry.
In defensive mimicry, a model is the organism whose genuine properties give meaning to the signal copied by another species. A venomous coral snake bears a conspicuous banded pattern that predators may learn, or sometimes be predisposed, to avoid. A harmless or less dangerous snake resembling that pattern can consequently receive protection as a Batesian mimic. The coral snake is therefore the defended reference phenotype, while the look-alike is the mimic. Calling the coral snake an educator anthropomorphizes the process: predators acquire information through encounters, but the snake does no
Ref: Evolutionary Analysis, Herron & Freeman, 5th Ed., Ch. 10
