Buyer beware

[Josh]

this thread is a thread to help people when buying snakes,
Dont buy from Exotic Reptiles For Sale!
they cant even get the names right

[ssssnakeluvr]

I have seen them before...what a joke..never heard of a gartner snake!!!

[Josh]

checkered garter t sarutis??

[zooplan]

Thats quit normal in German pet shops
Most garters a offered only as garters not as their speci.
Once I saw a beautiful "Florida Blue" signed as T. a. atratus(Santa Cruz Garter Snake)

[Stefan-A]

The biggest local chain refers to garters snakes as "Thamnopsis" on their homepage, order them from the importer as "T. sirtalis similis", and although they called my latest snake (parietalis) a "T. similis", they were honest enough to sell it as a Thamnophis sp. when I asked them if they knew the species. I personally consider the clerks more professional than the chain as a whole.

[drache]

our local store just calls them garter snakes too
but two of the sales clerks know me well enough to ask me stuff
I expect more from people who sell over the internet because one cannot see or handle the snake before purchasing
of course this expectation in not often met
when I do buy from internet sellers I don't know, I try to get some email dialogue going to get some sense of the person before I commit to a purchase
I also use the BOI on faunaclassifieds.com - with a couple of grains of salt
(I've bought from people who had bad feedback, if the person with the complaint seemed like an idiot)
it's always taking a chance though

[GarterGuy]

Guess I'm pretty lucky around here then, my local petstore is very good at getting common and genus/species pretty much on the money. Guess it doesn't hurt that the pres. of the local herp society works there too...and he's into garters as well.

Roy

[ssssnakeluvr]

hmmmmmm......I haven't seen a garter in a pet store here in Salt Lake City for years.......I bought the last pair I saw, ordinoides at a petco....we have some good local stores and some crappy ones...