Greetings from Ohio

[gordonthegarter]

Hi, I'm Cara and today would be my second day as a garter snake owner. I've owned cats my whole life, birds for a very large chunk of it, dogs the past 8 years, and last year I finally got my first reptile - a green iguana named Iggy (short for Iguanadon)

A few years ago I tried to bring home a garter who lived in my grandma's backyard that her cat attacked and it was half paralyzed, but to no avail. Well yesterday we went on a hike (it was in the mid 50's yesterday) and while on the walk a snake darts past us on the path. I followed him and picked him up (and dropped him accidentally because he tried to bite but got him back and got him to calm down). We got some pictures of him and took him on our hike with us and along the way, bonded and ended up taking this brave little guy home.

I bought some crickets (since by the time I could get to the pet store they were closing in 10 minutes so I had to be quick!) so if he got hungry he could snack. Going to buy him some feeder minnows tomorrow and some nightcrawlers after work so he has something better to eat. He ignores his hidey log and slept using the edge of his water dish as a pillow. He was more than happy to come out and hang out with me today, and he's curled up on my chest in my shirt looking around as I type this. I love this little guy already and can't wait to find out more things about him!

I'm pretty sure it's a he after doing a lot of reading. He's skinnier, very active, and his body goes seemlessly to his tail. I'm also thinking he may be a wandering garter, but not 100% positive. My mom named him Gordon, or if he's really a she it's Gardenia.

[Stefan-A]

Welcome aboard.

[channa]

Welcome

[Invisible Snake]

Hello and welcome to the forum!

Please take a minute to read through the forums caresheet Garter Snake Forum - Garter Caresheet (http://www.thamnophis.com/index.php?page=caresheet)

[gregmonsta]

Greetings :D

[Selkielass]

Awww, he's beautiful! He looks a lot like my male Eastern garter 'Christmas'.
Night crawlers are in my experience, the best start in captivity food. Once he gets eating, safe fish, pre killed rodents, chicken bits, and almost anything else meaty will probably be eagerly accepted.
The above linked care sheet is a great starting read and welcome to the Tham-ily!

[guidofatherof5]

Hello Cara.
Welcome to the forum.
Ditch the crickets and don't feed minnows. Garters don't eat crickets(insects) and minnows as a rule carry a heavy parasite load and contain thiaminase which over a long period of time is deadly to garters. I'll give a link to the forum care sheet at the end of my post, both issues are covered there.
Looks like Ohio has 3 garter species native to the State. Butler's (Thamnophis butleri), Eastern (Thamnophis sirtalis sirtalis) and Plains (Thamnophis radix).
Looks to me like an Eastern Garter Snake. Not sure of the sex. I'll provide a link to a thread that will help you sex your snake on your own or at least show you the type of photos to post so we can help.
Garter Snake Forum - Garter Caresheet (http://www.thamnophis.com/index.php?page=caresheet)
http://www.thamnophis.com/forum/breeding/5069-sexing-pics.html

[BLUESIRTALIS]

Welcome to the forum Cara! It looks like an eastern to me as well. As Steve already stated ditch the crickets because garters don't eat insects and even if you could entice him to eat them they can't digest the exoskeleton. Read over the caresheet and you should do just fine. That is a very nice looking snake!

[chris-uk]

Welcome aboard.

Steve has given the essential, immediate advice above.

[Foxrun402]

Welcome Cara! Your little friend looks so happy with you out exploring! haha!

Have a good look around this place it's full of good information and people willing to help you along the way! I'm almost certain that garter snake has taken to you by the look of those pictures! =)

[rickymar81]

Welcome Cara! You got a good looking guy there:cool:

[gordonthegarter]

Thanks for all the replies and advice already! Measured him last night and he's somewhere in the 20 - 24 inch range (he wasn't being very cooperative to be measured, too much to explore!) Will free the crickets tomorrow when it's a little warmer (they should be happy, they've been saved from being eaten by things... Well housed things anyway!)

I love this little guy. He very willingly comes out to hang out with me and just yawned and was by far the cutest thing I've seen a snake do. Here's a few better pictures (one really good one to see his paint job) and a couple vent area pics. Pretty sure he's a male, but you guys are probably better at guessing than me!

848284838484 see, it looks like he was painted and it chipped off haha
8486 best picture of the vent area I could get (he doesn't like holding still unless "cuddling" :3)

[Jeff B]

Welcome Cara. I'm going to go out on a limb and say that snake looks like a normally thin post brumation FEMALE. Without having in my hands I could be wrong though. Best of luck with him or her which ever it ends up being. Course if it's female and was bred you might have some babies on your hands in a few months.

[chris-uk]

I'd also suggest that it's female rather than male.

Nice looking snake, the subtle red colours are nice.

[guidofatherof5]

Female. Nice taper from the vent plus the overall body size and head structure say female to me;)

[BLUESIRTALIS]

Nice looking girl!

[gordonthegarter]

Looks like Gordon might need a more girly name haha. Such a sweet snake! Loves to cuddle, tries to climb back out the second she goes into her cage to stay with me, such a calm snake for being wild! I think I lucked out here.

Won't touch her fish, and I have off today so buying some crawlers and spending the day with some scaley cuddles (along with an iguana bath cause the other scaley friend needs love too :D)

[StrmChasr]

Hello and welcome. I have an Eastern garter myself that I caught back in September. Walmart is a good place to get nightcrawlers. That's what I feed mine when it's too cold to catch them in the yard. It may take some time for her to get settled in before she starts eating. I think it took about a week for Napolean to settle in and start eating.

[gordonthegarter]

Bought her some nightcralwers. She looked a little interested (stared down the squirming worm bits) but ignored them after that. Also bought some calcium supplement (with D3 added) and a nicer water dish/soaking tub. She isn't a huge fan of the water yet, but it is still cool and 'm sure once it gets warmer in here she'll be loving that dish! The first one I bought for her is going to be cleaned and given to the iguana. I'm sure he'll love the new dish.

I'm sure I was getting weird looks at Walmart too! Buying a thing of worms and some cookies and cereal haha! And after reading a thread about snake belly buttons, I got curious and looked at her belly and sure enough, there's a white line where it used to be!

Oh! And I told my mom that Gordon's most likely a girl, so her name is now Violet! Was between that, Blossom, Gardenia, and I threw Ivy in there but my mom wasn't ready to give up one of her kitten names to a "slimey snake" (we took care of 17 kittens over last summer and own 2 of them, sisters from the same litter too. My house is a zoo!)

[guidofatherof5]

Great caution must be take when cats are around garters. Be sure you have a secure strong lid that the cats can't get into or fall threw if they jump on it.
This forum has had many threads about injured garters at the hands of cats.;)

[gordonthegarter]

Oh we know plenty on how tricky cats are with cages! I've lost a few hamsters and a budgie and some finches to cats before. She has lid clips on her cage both so she can't escape and so the cats can't open it. Her cage is also ontop of iggy's and my ceilings are at an angle so there's no room for the cats to get on top of it (plus it keeps Iggy from pushing the lids off his cage and escaping! [actually he just sits on top of the one lid next to the heat lamp but still] But might get him this nice 40 gal atrium tonight which has a better lid)

That and since my budgie's in my room, only 4 of the cats are trusted to even be in here, and all are supervised while in the room. No animals come out of the cages if the cats are in here! Door is always closed to keep those brats from getting in here.

[acovert]

What a pretty girl! My boyfriend and I just recently found what appears to be a male T. Ordinoides (Northwestern). It's so much fun finding garters, and even more fun when they become a part of your family.

Do be careful with the cats, as Steve said. My cat doesn't care about my little boy (Cuddles, also Northwestern) if I'm with him, but if I'm not there he starts to show more interest, so I have to keep a close eye on him all the time. He seems to think that Cuddles is a wiggly piece of string.


My house is a zoo!

I love having a zoo :) My family has a cat and a dog and two goldfish, but when you walk in my room there are two beta fish, 20+ community fish, 2 adult snails, 30 baby snails, 2 hermit crabs, a cat, and a snake. I have a zoo in my bedroom!

[guidofatherof5]

Oh we know plenty on how tricky cats are with cages! I've lost a few hamsters and a budgie and some finches to cats before. She has lid clips on her cage both so she can't escape and so the cats can't open it. Her cage is also ontop of iggy's and my ceilings are at an angle so there's no room for the cats to get on top of it (plus it keeps Iggy from pushing the lids off his cage and escaping! [actually he just sits on top of the one lid next to the heat lamp but still] But might get him this nice 40 gal atrium tonight which has a better lid)

That and since my budgie's in my room, only 4 of the cats are trusted to even be in here, and all are supervised while in the room. No animals come out of the cages if the cats are in here! Door is always closed to keep those brats from getting in here.

Sounds like you know what you are up against.

[gordonthegarter]

Thank you :3 she is quite a pretty little girl! The pet store up the street has a reptile beauty contest every summer, maybe I should enter her this year :p and your new snake is such a cutey! Always read how corns are more docile and calm than garters, but I haven't met one garter who wasn't nice (except when being caught the first time but that's understandable!) as apposed to the young corn my dad saved from being hit by a car who tried to kill him. Then there was the 8ft boa my brother's friend ran over with his car who was VERY unhappy with him when he tried to get it out of the road to a vet! (he kept that snake too)

The first garter I wanted to bring home was half paralyzed because my grandma let her cats in the backyard and they got him. It had been an old injury so he was obviously doing ok, but it was just so sad. Only found him because their one cat had him cornered in a bush! That one didn't care about being held at all (then again it was getting cold out and only his front half could move to try to get away) I love going out to find snakes. Last summer went on a hike by the marsh and found 15 water snakes! At the apartment complex we used to live at i almost caught a very pretty black garter, but it got away in a chipmunk home (and boy was the chipmunk not happy! Fired out of there like a bullet!!!) This little one just happened across our path and took me a bit off trial to get her but it was worth it! Even after a couple attempts to bite. Great hiking pal and met a very nice family who's littest boy wanted to pet her (and oldest was unsure but did it anyway cause his dad egged him on lol!)

And oh dear is our house a zoo! We have 4 dogs (one of which we found as a scared, skinny, dirty, flea bitten stray and his family gave him too us), cats (not even going to put how many cause you'd think we were nuts but most of them we didn't mean to take in!) an iguana, a budgie, the last of our community fish just died and we're taking a break from them so we can paint the living room, my dad wants finches again soon, and 1 chubby guinea pig. Should start charging people to come in and pet everybody!!!

Definitely know what I'm up against with these felines. Two of them are the ones who got my first budgie 11 years ago (team work and we think we know which one actually ate the poor thing). 2 of the trusted ones have been well suprvised around other pets and are actually afraid of them and declawed (seriously, the one wouldn't even look at the starling I had even when it was pulling her ear because if you don't see it, it's not there). The other two are two of the kittens we raised over the summer since they were 7 days old and have been allowed in my room since then, but still not trusted with animals out of the cage and NOBODY is trusted with them out of the cage and unsupervised! Too many things can go wrong way too quickly with cats around. Love them, but they are huge brats and think if they want it, they're entitled to have it!

[gordonthegarter]

Offered Violet her two fish, more interested today than before but still not too keen on them (I think I have 2 tiny feeders for pets now :rolleyes:)

Offered her a still squirming around third of a crawler from a couple days ago (those things are tough aren't they?) and she very happily ate it up! Found one of the other thirds and cut up a new one and she ate it all. 5 crawler thirds makes for one chubby happy Vi!

8507

Happy chubby snake who probably would have kept eating but I didn't want to over feed her and she already had a slight buldge. It's so cute how they wipe off their faces! Her plate's a bit messy, no? Lol. Need to get her a better eating tray and a better place than on my bed :rolleyes:

So happy she ate finally! And since I got her new "pool" one side of it has no substrate built up next to it (between the side and the wall) and guess where her new hidey spot is. Though now she's digesting under her log / hut, though wasn't too happy being put away. I got the "mommy keep me out and play!" look.

How long after a feeding can you hold the snake again? Don't want to upset the snakey tummy.

[guidofatherof5]

You can wait 24 hours and run the risk of getting it from the other end:D

[Foxrun402]

Yup.... 24 hours after eating night-crawler while being handled....
http://i1342.photobucket.com/albums/o774/foxrun402/New%20pics%20of%20Suzi/temporary_zpsd349a7bc.jpg

And when you wipe it off... it will not smell pretty at all lol :D

[guidofatherof5]

A garter snake victory.:D

[gordonthegarter]

So in other words, wait for the poop then hold :p

It's weird, but they're so cute eating! How they readjust their little jaw into place and wipe their little mouths off when they're done! And the focus. And of course try to get a video of her attacking it and what does she give me? 30 seconds of staring down the food until the second I hit stop, then BAM! Sneaky sneaky. I swear all animals know when they're being filmed and they just stop doing what they were going to do until the camera is off! Did get video of her chowing down though and a really nice pic of her bout to eat that really brings out her colors :D

[guidofatherof5]

No, hold the snake. Getting pooped on comes with the care.;):D

[gordonthegarter]

Haha true. I've been pooped on by birds, the iguana, the kittens we took care of over the summer. What's one more animal on the list? :p

[Selkielass]

I keep a couple old kitchen towels around to use as lap pads when handling garters. They get a quick lukewarm bath in the sink, and this or drying them off usually stimulates a poop. After this you are usually pretty safe for at least half a day, or until the next feeding.

This routine is a good one when around kids.

[gordonthegarter]

That's a very good idea, i'll have to keep this in mind and get some snake towels to keep up here.

[gordonthegarter]

And somebody's already a bit fatter from just one meal. My little pudgy cuddly scaley friend :rolleyes: