New member!

[Nir]

Hello people!!

My name is Nicholas and I'm new here on your forum. Seems like there is a whole lot of info here!! I'm a biologist. I have been keeping herps for about 15 years and have been breeding some for about 8.... I keep a variety of species (Spilotes, Lampropeltis, Pantherophis, Boa, Bogertophis, Heterodon, etc...) as I love the diversity of herps on our planet.

Being from Canada, I've long been a fan of Thamnophis. I've been wanting to get a nice Garter snake for a while, but there aren't many keepers here in Canada... Last year I caught a very nice pair of easterns. I kept them for exactly an hour and released them back.... I felt guilty... hehe

So all that to say, yesterday, I was lucky enough to find a VERY nice female Eastern Black Necked Garter CB at the Manchester Expo in NH! I'm stocked, it was love at first sight!! hehe

I don't have any photos of her yet, I'm letting her settle in. But, just to quench the thirst for pics, I'll leave you guys with some Thamnophis sirtalis from my neck of the woods!

http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y36/nir/Tsirtalisnice.jpg



http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y36/nir/IMG_0309.jpg

http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y36/nir/Smallgartercopy.jpg

http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y36/nir/Biggartercopy.jpg

http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y36/nir/ecoregion2009/ECL615_2009_036.jpg


This is a weird "pseudo albino" I found in 06. She was in really bad shape and lived 3 days after being in my care....

http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y36/nir/Albinos5.jpg




I like posts with pictures mouahahah! Hope you didn't have enough cause I've got lots of pics of wild garters!

[Stefan-A]

Welcome aboard. :)

[charles parenteau]

Welcome abord !!remember me from naturama??Salut mec ca va!!??

[Odie]

Hi, from Oregon, Nicholas :)

[charles parenteau]

amenes en des photos c'est ca les gens veulent si tu aime les garter cest ici le best!!!A tu des photos de pallidulus ou intergrade pallidulusxsirtalis??
Pallidulus orangé ??Bring us pictures of your wild garter snake I know you have plenty of!!

[snakeman]

The first one is exactly what I am looking for!

[guidofatherof5]

Welcome from the Gilfillan's in Iowa.
The State of radix! T.radix that is.:D

[Charis]

Hello & welcome from Idaho! Great pictures! Yeah, I think we could be persuaded to look at a few more, if you twist our arms really hard. LOL

[charles parenteau]

Tom ,high yellow on dark back ground are not rare find an in some place its the standard color ..Sherbrooke is 45 min from here.
I love the picture and there is yellow on the belly that very nice!!!

[ssssnakeluvr]

welcome to the fourm! awesome loooking snakes!!

[prattypus]

Those are quite a sampling- Not that I don't love the Wanderings around here, but those are stunning.

[gregmonsta]

Greetings :D

[DIRK]

Welcome, have fun;)

[jitami]

Welcome :)

[drache]

welcome to the forum
quite a variety of stunning sirtalis in your neck of the woods
great photos too

[Nir]

Thanks everyone for the warm welcome!! I look forward to seeing and reading everyones posts!! I'll add a couple more pics later!

[charles parenteau]

Hi Nir by the way Patrice Lavigne lives in Sherbrooke by now he his by far the best herper i never known ,IM off job for at least 2-3 week and i will plan a herping day with him ,maybe you should join us or at least you should meet Pat you probably know him!!

J'espere herper avec toi un jour!! essaye de rejoindre Pat tu vas voir c'est un des meilleurs que tu puisses renconté ds le domaine....

[ConcinusMan]

Welcome from "the other Vancouver"

Oh wow. I really like that first snake.

[MasSalvaje]

Welcome Nick! Is the eye on that last pic naturally pink or was it from an injury? Nice find either way, it is too bad it didn't make it.

-Thomas

[Snakers]

that last pic looks just like shannos old hypo, good to have you on the forum

[Spankenstyne]

Heya Nir, great to see you made it over here. Looking forward to more of your great photo essays.

[ConcinusMan]

I like posts with pictures mouahahah! Hope you didn't have enough cause I've got lots of pics of wild garters!

Is there such thing as "enough" ??? No. Not really, because then it becomes "too much" and too much = "Never enough"

It would be extremely helpful if notes about habitat, location, and variability were provided though. Makes it more interesting.

[Nir]

Yes Charles, I do know Pat and have met him a few times. I would love to go herping with you guys if we could find a suitable date... hehe A hard thing to do with me, as I am the kind of guy that runs around like crazy all the time!

Hey sprakenstyne! Glad to see you here!

Mr. ConcinnusMan, here is the definition of "enough" :


as much as necessary; "Have I eaten enough?"; (`plenty' is nonstandard) "I've had plenty, thanks"
an adequate quantity; a quantity that is large enough to achieve a purpose; "enough is as good as a feast"; "there is more than a sufficiency of lawyers in this country"


So reading your reply, I take it that you haven't had "plenty"... Or that the adequate quantity is a number close to ∞ therefore quite unreachable.... sadly. So since I have no choice. Another selection of pictures for you guys!

Huge female eastern:
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y36/nir/ecoregion2009/ECL615_2009_023.jpg

Trio of adult basking in situ after a short rain:
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y36/nir/ecoregion2009/ECL615_2009_045.jpg

Nice high yellow eastern male:
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y36/nir/Tsirtalisclassique.jpg

This is interesting. Basking in situ garter. Outside temps 12-15 Celcius. Ground temp 20 Celcius... Snakes temperature:

http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y36/nir/Tsirtalistemps.jpg

Small orange eastern
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y36/nir/IMG_6433.jpg

If a garter could measure 9 feet. What would it look like?







My guess is something like this:

http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y36/nir/IMG_7417.jpg

[charles parenteau]

NIr what about the snow in Sherbrooke how much did you get????

[Quibble]

Welcome from Michigan! :D

[Nir]

NIr what about the snow in Sherbrooke how much did you get????

We didn't get as much as you! But we got some... Really ****** temperature if you ask me!!

[ConcinusMan]

I was going to say that pics 1 and 3 look like T.s. parietalis.

So educate me. Does a T.s. parietalis have to have red spots? I mean what makes you call them easterns? Where's the distinction? (there I go splitting hairs again)

[Nir]

Really, I could not tell you what phenotypical characteristics distinguish the T. s. parietalis from the T. s. sirtalis. Most T. s. parietalis I've seen pictured seem to have the red on the sides. And, normally, easterns do not have the small red blotches found in most parietalis. But in both cases, I've seen, either pictures or specimens, some individual that could easily be mistaken for antoher ssp. if locality wasn't known....

As for the pictures showed here, they are from snakes around the Gatineau/Ottawa region in Quebec/Ontario therefore out of the range of T. s. parietalis which stops in western Ontario.

[drache]

great photos again - thanks
this coming Saturday I am doing a few workshops with my reptiles at a primary school science day event. The day's theme will be energy, so my workshops will be tailored around that, addressing thermo-regulation, the carbon footprints of pets, and the personal energy expenditures of keeping them. your temperature measurements remind me of how efficiently they absorb solar heat. it's quite amazing, isn't it?

[ConcinusMan]

OK, then that explains it. If you really are outside their range, then they must be easterns. Man, that black and yellow one is very handsome.

[MoJo]

Hey Nicholas,

I am pretty sure that was one of my babies from a few years ago. I wish you would have brought it by my table. I would have love to seen it. I am glad you got her.

[Nir]

Hey Nicholas,

I am pretty sure that was one of my babies from a few years ago. I wish you would have brought it by my table. I would have love to seen it. I am glad you got her.


Hey Joanna! I don't know if you remember me, I'm the tall guy (and probably the only french canadian there! hehe)

The fellow I bought it from said it was one of your babies... And believe me, I wanted to come by your table, but in the excitement of having new exciting stuff, completely forgot.... I thought about it after leaving... sorry!!

I will still be looking to buy one of your future babies if you ever have the chance to produce some more!! hehe

[MoJo]

Of course I remember you. How many French Canadians show up at that show on a regular basis looking for garters!

I saw your post on temperament. I have found my eastern black necks to be flighty and musky but I also don't handle them a lot. The first snake to bite me was actually my big girl. I remember being very surprised and then laughing at the absurdity of a less than 8 oz snake biting me!

[Nir]

Of course I remember you. How many French Canadians show up at that show on a regular basis looking for garters!

I saw your post on temperament. I have found my eastern black necks to be flighty and musky but I also don't handle them a lot. The first snake to bite me was actually my big girl. I remember being very surprised and then laughing at the absurdity of a less than 8 oz snake biting me!

They do pack up a lot of attitude in that little body of theirs! hehe So is 8 oz the actual breeding size of your big girl? If you ever want to add pics of the adults that produced my little one, it would be nice! I believe she is one of your 08 babies.

[Mommy2many]

Sorry I'm late to the post! Welcome from Connecticut!

[MoJo]

They do pack up a lot of attitude in that little body of theirs! hehe So is 8 oz the actual breeding size of your big girl? If you ever want to add pics of the adults that produced my little one, it would be nice! I believe she is one of your 08 babies.

I actually don't remember the last time I weighed them. Your girl is an 07 whose Mom was my beloved Cheetah. If you look in the MoJo photo album there is a photo of her there. I need to get a photo of BIlly the Kid the dad. Both Cheetah and Billy the Kid are/were not big snakes. The heaviest weight I have on Cheetah was 161g and Billy the Kid isn't much more than 50 g. But I stopped weighing my adult snakes a long time ago so they might have gotten bigger.

[MoJo]

Oh and it wasn't Cheetah that bit me. She was a sweetie. It was Tiger.

[Nir]

Oh and it wasn't Cheetah that bit me. She was a sweetie. It was Tiger.

Thanks for the info! I looked at the pictures!! Those are some really nice black necks !!! Especially Clementine! She looks like she is a chunker too!! hehe

[MoJo]

Clementine now lives in Toronto. She was huge! She was beautiful but I did not like the color of her sides - there were a little too creamy for me. I also bought her as a male so I ended up selling her.

[Nir]

Looking back at the pictures, I think I can see what you mean about the sides. However, what caught my eye the first time was her very wide dorsal stripe!! Awesome!

Any luck with breedings this year? What do you pocess garter wise? (if you don't mind me asking! :D )