Guess who was smart, yert fealt stupid in the first wildlife management lab?

[mustang]

this is my second day at SFASU and my first wildlife management class and lab were today. We talked about varied species and the beginning was all herpetology.... i learned a lot but i was the one shouting out the answers to all his questions like "Are water snakes or garter snakes venomous?" "Well garters are but not to humans, their neurotoxin is lethal to amphibians" "...oh well i meant people"(the TA was teaching it and he seemed genuinely baffled), the taxonomy wasnt too hard but i pounced when it came to garter snakes :D

[guidofatherof5]

Tear them up Robert:D

[mustang]

I'm trying my best :D no prisoners... (except the pretty college girls ;) the girl to guy ratio here is 7:1 :D )

[Greg'sGarters]

Garters actually do have very mild affects on humans. I got bit on Sunday by my eastern female, and you can see where the posterior fangs hit it is bluish red with a scabbed over dot in the middle. And then little tiny red marks for where her teeth were. When I got it it was actually a pretty bad bite (compared to most garters). It even swelled up a little, and it was much more red at the time, it turned red after I had washed it off and stopped the bleeding (it turned bluer after an hour or so). It felt like a combination of a itchiness, and numbness. That was a really extreme case though. It is rare for this ever to happen, but I am to blame, I should have washed my hands off after working with cut open pinkies, her favorite.



7988

You can see how it started swelling in this picture. It is not very red there, it started to turn red when I stopped the bleeding. But the mark hasn't gone away yet, but it has improved since then. I wish I had taken a picture 2 hours later when it was at it's worst.


Anyway, I wish you a lot of luck in this class!

[Greg'sGarters]

Posterior fangs

My bad, garters don't have fangs. Posterior teeth.

[-MARWOLAETH-]

Im going for a herpetology course at Bangor Uni.Cant wait!


oh and the venom isnt lethal it just calms or stuns the prey making eating it easier.

[mustang]

thanks Greg and good luck to you Will

[ConcinusMan]

oh and the venom isnt lethal it just calms or stuns the prey making eating it easier.

Yes, apparently at least on amphibians, it has a calming sedative effect. Naturally, it's struggling amphibians that are going to get a good dose as the snake "chews" and the amphibian struggles. After a brief struggle, they just seem to give up and calm down as they're being swallowed alive. Partially due to the garter "venom".

[CrazyHedgehog]

Im going for a herpetology course at Bangor Uni.Cant wait!


Bangor do a herp course? I live in driving distance of Bangor... what course? I wonder if I can do it around work?

[-MARWOLAETH-]

Bangor do a herp course? I live in driving distance of Bangor... what course? I wonder if I can do it around work?

It's called Zoology with herpetology :]

[MasSalvaje]

Yes, apparently at least on amphibians, it has a calming sedative effect. Naturally, it's struggling amphibians that are going to get a good dose as the snake "chews" and the amphibian struggles. After a brief struggle, they just seem to give up and calm down as they're being swallowed alive. Partially due to the garter "venom".

You guys need to read this: http://vipersgarden.at/PDF_files/PDF-2306.pdf
The venom of garters is much more complex than you all are giving it credit for as a mild "calming sedative."

-Thomas

[ConcinusMan]

Well, the study was done on vagrans and they are known to feed heavily on rodents. In fact, in all my years of herping and seeing snakes vomit prey items, a wild vagrans last summer was the only time I've ever seen a garter vomit up a rodent. They're also (wild vagrans from that area) the only garters I've ever fed in captivity that I've observed to actually coil around or pin their food down. It would make sense that not all garters would necessarily be that toxic especially if their target prey is something that is much easier to subdue, such as a small frog or salamander/newt and that level of toxicity is surely not necessary for something like a northwestern that feeds heavily on worms and slugs.

[MasSalvaje]

Well, the study was done on vagrans and they are known to feed heavily on rodents. In fact, in all my years of herping and seeing snakes vomit prey items, a wild vagrans last summer was the only time I've ever seen a garter vomit up a rodent. They're also (wild vagrans from that area) the only garters I've ever fed in captivity that I've observed to actually coil around or pin their food down. It would make sense that not all garters would necessarily be that toxic especially if their target prey is something that is much easier to subdue, such as a small frog or salamander/newt and that level of toxicity is surely not necessary for something like a northwestern that feeds heavily on worms and slugs.

As I said, garter venom is much more complex than to justify the use of over arching statements that attempt to sum it all up in a single sentence or phrase, or even in a single study.

-Thomas

[KephrenJorgensen]

I cant seem to find the file anymore, but I was researching the Duvernoy's gland for a school project, and found some other possible uses for it. In species like ordinoides that feed primarily on invbertebrates, the secretions contain traces phospholipase A, and it is thought to be used to increase the surface area of prey for digestion immediately following contact, among its other effects. It was described as a similarity to the way a human's saliva immediately beings to break down starch.

[KephrenJorgensen]

begins * :p

[guidofatherof5]

I cant seem to find the file anymore, but I was researching the Duvernoy's gland for a school project, and found some other possible uses for it. In species like ordinoides that feed primarily on invbertebrates, the secretions contain traces phospholipase A, and it is thought to be used to increase the surface area of prey for digestion immediately following contact, among its other effects. It was described as a similarity to the way a human's saliva immediately beings to break down starch.

ScienceDirect.com - Toxicon - The toxic Duvernoy's secretion of the wandering garter snake, Thamnophis elegans vagrans (http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/0041010181900799)

An Error Occurred Setting Your User Cookie (http://informahealthcare.com/doi/abs/10.3109/15563658108990284)

Lethal factors and enzymes in the secretion from Duvernoy's gland of three colubrid snakes - Rosenberg - 2005 - Journal of Experimental Zoology - Wiley Online Library (http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/jez.1402330103/abstract)

JSTOR: An Error Occurred Setting Your User Cookie (http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/1444728?uid=3739640&uid=2&uid=4&uid=3739256&sid=21101834125867)