So I keep getting worried that I'm doing something wrong with my new baby garter.. it's really confusing because I've kept snakes before, and the general rules of thumb usually apply to most snake species... except I keep reading on here about how a lot of people keep garters so much differently than other species.

Most of my experience has been with corn snakes, but I decided to branch out and get rid of some of my corns. Anyway, my albino checkered girl just shed yesterday so I decided to offer her first meal at her new home, a F/T pinky head. She took it very quickly and at first I was worried it was too big for her but after a few minutes she managed to get it down. It's left a fairly sizable lump in her belly but she seemed content enough to climb out of her own dixie cup (what I use as a feeding container to avoid ingesting substrate) and crawled around a bit before retiring to one of her hides...

A little while later I read something about not feeding baby garters meals bigger than their heads ??? The pinky head was probably about 1.5x larger than her head, just a little larger than the widest part of her body..

Also, every other snake I've ever had has only eaten once a week at the most, and generally tend to live longer and maintain healthier weights if fed about once every other week. But it seems like a lot of people here feed their snakes much more often, and regularly provide "snacks" between meals. Isn't it unhealthy for a snake's stomach to contain food at all times? I'm just beyond confused at this point lol

I really really would like to keep my snake on a primarily mouse diet. It's easier and I have a lot of F/T mice, plus that's what she was started on.

I would be willing to maybe alternate meals of pinky heads and earth worms, but I really don't want to have to start buying $3 live fish as the only guppies and such I can find around here are fancy guppies and they are expensive lol

Could someone just give me a general run down of feeding for garter snakes, from neonates to adults?

thanks!