Red Sided Babies

[mkochsch]

We caught a year old female about a week and a half ago. Tried feeding it some pinkies. Wouldn't take them. Just thought she wasn't hungery. This morning we have a single baby red-sided on our hands.
WHAT DO I FEED A BABY GARTER? THX.
~m

[Didymus20X6]

Small worms. Not red wigglers, but maybe some smaller nightcrawlers. Some people feed them chopped up nightcrawlers.

[ssssnakeluvr]

feeder guppies in a small clear water dish should work good.

[mkochsch]

Thx. Will try!

[Corinne33]

Same thing you feed an adult snake, just smaller :-)

[Calift]

Make sure the pinkies are very hot when you feed them...I find that helps since snakes heavily rely on their thermal-sensing to find prey.

If not, just keep trying a variety of different foods until you find one she eats.

[Stefan-A]

Make sure the pinkies are very hot when you feed them...I find that helps since snakes heavily rely on their thermal-sensing to find prey.

"Very hot" better not mean anything significantly above a live rodent's normal body temperature, unless you're deliberately trying to injure the snake.

That thing about snakes relying heavily on their thermal sensing to find prey doesn't really apply to garters (among many others), even if it can help a little in those few instances when they go after mammals. They tend to locate their prey with their sense of smell, but their eyesight is what they ultimately rely on to catch it. In other words, the smell is sufficient by itself to elicit a feeding response, but movement does help.