Baby garter snakes won't eat. Help?!

[NickeyV]

Hi everyone. I am new to this forum so I don't know much here. But anyway, a while back I got my first pet garter snake. I didn't know whether it was male or female but named it Lucifer. One day it surprised me with 20 babies! 3 never made it. The other day I bought some fuzzy mice for Lucifer and waxworms for the babies. 8 of them ate the waxworms including one of them a runt cause he was the smallest. I gave him a small one and he was able to eat. A couple of days later I found him dead. Maybe it was too big for him? I don't know but I blame myself. Now I have 16 and 8 of them just wont eat. Including one that is deformed. Is there any way to make them eat? I tried waxworms and pieces of fish fillet. I would try different things but we have no money with the way the economy is. I need to know A.S.A.P.

[Thamnophis]

When I have young garter snakes that refuse to eat, I cut small pieces of fish (usually smelt) and put them on a dish in a layer of water in which the fish thawed. Most of them start to eat in this way. I give this every day for a week or so.

[katach]

Welcome to the forum family! Try night crawlers and slugs. Cut the night crawler into pieces smaller than their head so it's easy for them to eat. You may have to use a pair of tweezers and put it right in their face. A picture of your little ones would be helpful too. Also, read the care sheet it has lots of great information.
Garter Snake Care Sheet - Caresheets (http://www.thamnophis.com/caresheets/index.php?title=Garter_Snake_Care_Sheet)

[kibakiba]

Toss the wax worms. Garters don't eat bugs. Try night crawlers, salmon, tilapia or pinky chunks.

[infernalis]

Toss the wax worms. Garters don't eat bugs. Try night crawlers, salmon, tilapia or pinky chunks.

Exactly what I was going to say, they cannot digest those correctly.

[RedSidedSPR]

First, do not feed WAX WORMS or any kind of "bug". I wouldn't feed adult mice either, but I think you can.Heck that's probably your biggest problem, they don't eat those, so no wonder they aren't eating. Try chopped nightcrawlers, live feeder guppies.

[kibakiba]

Fur can cause problems in some snakes. Garters don't (there are exceptions) always eat mice or rats in the wild, if they do its usually rare. Around here, garters eat nothing but worms and slugs with the occasional field mouse. There aren't many here, so naturally not many are ever eaten.

[sasmon]

This is an old thread, but I had this problem and wanted to share my experience in case others might find it useful. I have two snakes who eat just fine and another who was born on the same day, but has refused to eat since birth. This was the runt of the litter/clutch/bag of babies. So after a month and a day, he was about a third the size of his siblings and I tried everything I could to get it to eat, including putting him in a small container with only tiny pieces of food (cut up night-crawlers, tilapia, and smelt). I couldn't locate feeder guppies within an hour and a half of my house so that wasn't an option.

Finally, i just manually opened its mouth as gently as I could and put a piece in. I figured this last-ditch effort would result in the food being spit out, but to my amazement when I put him down he started attempting a swallow. Even though the piece was super tiny, he seemed to have trouble and it was tortuous to watch. But he finally swallowed it! I then tried with a bigger piece and he had less trouble this time. I'm hoping that when I try to feed him again tomorrow or in the next few days he will just eat normally, but at least I know now how to get him to eat. Hope this helps you.

[gibble888]

I have also forced food with good results....the next day he ate on his own and has been great ever since.....but some seem to think its taboo.

[guidofatherof5]

Sounds like it was your last thing to try. Please keep us posted on this little one.

[d_virginiana]

but some seem to think its taboo.

Because it usually doesn't work and can do far more harm than good, especially when someone inexperienced or new to garters (or snakes in general) tries it. If the snake is on death's door, it may be the only way, but it shouldn't be viewed as anything but a last resort because of these potential dangers.

[ConcinusMan]

Very risky, yes.

[gibble888]

So what is the reason some babies wont eat then die? Genetics? Defect? In reality if they dont eat then die isnt that just help to reinforce the gene poole? If you breed a snake that doesnt want to eat wont it have some babies that dont want to eat?

[sasmon]

I felt as if I was facing a choice between life and death. He started developing erratic behavior and avoiding hides, and was frightfully small compared to his siblings. I figure if a new snakelet doesn't eat for two weeks, judging from the info I've seen on here, then that's to be expected. But just over a month seems dangerous. Granted, in the wild the lil guy probably would have been eaten by something or just died, but I wanted him to live. So I did what I did and he's alive. I hope he'll make it on his own from now on. Attached is a picture of him and his sibling for a size comparison.9690

[gibble888]

Wow he is tiny...good luck i hope he makes it

[ConcinusMan]

So what is the reason some babies wont eat then die? Genetics? Defect?

Your guess is a good as any other. Glad you got him eating, but in the context of good numbers of healthy siblings, having a few that do not make it, or in your case, just one(?)... personally I wouldn't bother coddling him but that's just me. He's probably always going to have development issues.

I had a T. radix just like this one. She did end up eating OK but still didn't grow normally. By the time she was 2, she was still 1/3 the size of her siblings and was plagued by stuck sheds. She eventually died anyway after all the effort to save her. The only reason I bothered at all is because she was cariad's offspring and double het for T- and t+ albino and I wanted to breed her to her half brother, a bright orange t- albino. Her dying was probably for the best if this problem had a genetic component.

[sasmon]

I get that. :) But he's so damn cute! I put the food in front of his mouth today and he opened right up and took it from me.
9712

[guidofatherof5]

That's great. I hope the eating continues.