Scary Moment

[ConcinusMan]

I thought I was done with this subject but I must chime in.

And you wanted me to send you a couple of my radixes! I think they will be staying in Iowa. Safe and sound.
Personanly, don't like your flippant attitude about feeding off the one animal this website is dedicated to and I don't care if there's a lot of them.
I know of a couple members that have feed dead/stillborns/deformed garters to other animals in their collections but to feed garters just to feed another snake or any other animal doesn't sit right with me.
I've only been a member of this forum for less than two years but have spent a lot of time reading old threads. I don't remember reading any comments from current or past members referring to feeding healthy garters to other animals. I know that we disagree on this subject and to each his own, but I'm not going to be silent
I'm sorry if this offends you but I couldn't let your comment sit.

It was a long time ago. I wouldn't intentionally use them as food anymore. I just didn't have anything else for my kingsnake at the time. I'm not offended. It happened and I'm not ashamed of it.

I get scolded by people all the time for feeding rodents to my snakes too and they would be just fine with it if I fed them other snakes instead. Unlike those people, I am unbiased. I say it makes no difference if you're feeding them rodents or other snakes but no matter how much sense I make, their attitude remains biased in favor of the mice because "that's different"

My girlfriend actually has your same feelings when it comes to the worms, fish, and mice being fed to my garters.(but you say that's different) I just tell her something is going to get eaten or the snake starves. Either way, something has to die. She says it's not fair. I tell her I didn't make the rules and it works both ways because snakes don't have special rights under the rules. They end up as food sometimes too.

She doesn't like it one bit. She wishes they were vegetarians, but they're not so no matter what I feed them, somebody gets upset about it.

Seems to help if it's in the shape of a can. Anybody know where I can get canned snake food so it's shaped like a can when I offer it? Seems that people don't get as upset about that.

[jitami]

I still think there's a huge difference between farmed, humanely killed, prey and prey taken from the wild that would have had a chance to 'go forth and prosper'. An animal already dead or destined to be so, ok, but our wild reptiles have enough to worry about without us handpicking them to feed to our pets. I also understand that some snakes are very tough/impossible to convert to rodents. That's an entirely different matter and I think every attempt should be made to convert said snake and then use captive bred reptiles to feed said snake. Most will take anoles or the like that you can get at most petstores for very little money.

[ConcinusMan]

I can agree with that idea. ^^^

Somehow I ended up being thought of as a cold heartless garter killer when I was only trying to illustrate that just because it's a garter snake doesn't make it any more or less appropriate as a food item. Some people think you have to be cruel and/or hate rodents in order to feed them to your snakes. Not true. To say that doesn't apply to every other animal used for food would be biased.

We used to have anoles in pet stores here, even at the time I came up here with my kingsnake. It would have taken a dozen to fill her up and they were $3.50 each. There are none now. Best you could hope for is to buy kinked corn snakes from a breeder or use WC or CB garters. So, I just like I did in San Diego, I went out looking for lizards for her. I found none. But you already know what I did find and she was starved.

Originally I said that I would have let the kingsnake eat the garter snake that slipped into the kingsnake's enclosure. That garter was captive born, it just so happens. But also, I feel that interrupting the process to save one garter can result in harm to the king AND may not always result in a save. That's the main reason I would have just let things take course. I wouldn't have purposely offered the garter as food since that king will gladly take rodents, but the accident happened and I wouldn't have intervened if swallowing had already commenced. I wouldn't want to force my garters or any of my snakes to cough up anything once swallowing had started, unless it was to save the life of the snake doing the swallowing.

[Stefan-A]

I have nothing against using snakes as food items. What I do have an issue with, is catching wild snakes and live-feeding. There are ways to avoid both.

[Spankenstyne]

A little bit off the topic but was brought up in this thread... It's not uncommon for some old time Kingsnake keepers to keep or have kept Kings in groups. It has to be approached differently than most of us keep our animals in the hobby though. It involves a lot more than just putting them together, it involves very large enclosures with wide temperature gradients, knowing how and when to introduce to see if they'll be compatible and what signs to look for, and so on.

Not something I'd recommend for just anyone, as there are certainly risks involved but is has been done very sucessfully and still is by some. Some older long-time field herpers I've chatted with over the years have mentioned finding kings in groups in the wild as well for what it's worth. Basically just pointing out how some of our "common knowledge" in the hobby isn't always as it seems.

[drache]

thanks for that post, Chris
my kings do have large enclosures by other people's standards
all of them have enclosures that are longer than they are, with proportionate widths
this is because when you give them enough space, they become more outgoing - almost a bit like garters. Mine are often at the front of their enclosures and active.
The only two I've got housing together though are the pair, and the more I observe them, the less I worry.

[ConcinusMan]

I'm sure you can find them in groups. I have found young siblings together under boards and debris but they aren't exactly piled up on each other, there is a few inches at least, between them. And that was early fall so they probably just hatched not long ago.

I've found two or more adults in the same manner in early spring. Doesn't take genius to figure out why they were together in either case. Even if I found these groups of snakes, as soon as you put them within reach or sight of one another it was always instant feeding response. Strike and constrict. No guessing if they were going to get along or not, no signs to look for other than one snake halfway down the others throat in an instant. Heck, they would even try to eat their own reflection. Groups? perhaps if it's winter and they are congregated at a den site or other shelter or gathered to breed. You also said it involved very large enclosures, and quite frankly most of the fairly large adult king snakes I've seen in the hobby were way overfed and would only eat rodents. That's a bit different than putting kings together that only eat lizards and other snakes.

[jitami]

Concinnus, I'm with you on just about every point... and honestly, I probably would have let things run it's course with the king & garter originally posted in this thread. I'm glad Steve was able to save both without any harm, but I wouldn't have trusted myself to do the same. I get you there.

I just have to point out this little bit...

We used to have anoles in pet stores here, even at the time I came up here with my kingsnake. It would have taken a dozen to fill her up and they were $3.50 each.

To me, the cost of feeding an animal that you chose to buy/catch/keep is just part of owning & caring for the animal. It's a responsibility you chose to take on. It would be like me buying a great dane and then complaining about how much it costs to feed it... could have just went with a pomeranian <gg>

[ConcinusMan]

Cost to feed it for the first 5 years were exactly what I expected it to cost when I decided to keep her. $0. Just a little bit of my time and effort to catch her food is all it cost. (I am told I am particularly good at catching fence lizards, netting about a dozen an hour) I understand where your statement is coming from but what if the price of night crawlers went from free or nearly free to more than $5 per worm and your garter would eat nothing else? Your great dane analogy only fits this situation if you discover that your great dane would rather starve itself to death than eat anything other than kobe beef.

And for the record, once I moved, I didn't complain about the cost to feed her since I didn't have any money anyway. (about $40 for one feeding of anoles) In all honesty, when I decided to take her with me, I thought I would be able to catch her food as I always had, or that she would eat rodents (stupid book said she would) which are reasonably priced. Starved her half to death proving otherwise. She flat refused rodents even in the face of starvation. And she wouldn't eat anything dead stefan. No tricks would fool her either. If she grabbed it and it didn't struggle, she'd let it go and starve.

The fact that lizards are extremely scarce here hadn't occurred to me. (stupid range maps) And as far as snakes go, ordinoides was the only one to be found reliably and in good quantity. I had no money. Even if I did, she wouldn't eat mice, and $40 every week for anoles is not only absurd, but impossible.

In the end, it was garter snakes and sometimes baby birds (non-native invasive species) in the summer, force feeding pinkies in the winter. That lasted about 2 years until I had enough. I went back to san diego to visit friends and I released her near where I found her. By then I had discovered concinnus and fell in love with them. I decided I wasn't going to let circumstances force me to go through that again and only kept native garters for 20 years after that.

[Tyrel26]

Hello all, I am new here but I figured why not add my 50c worth on this subject I currently work as a meat cutter (lamb,pig,cow) and i have no problem with the fact that these animals were raised for food but like someone has already said i do expect them to be treated with respect while they are living. Also I do a lot of hunting and fishing, ie wild animals for food. I love my garter and before i was able to trick her into taking mice I gave her frogs and fish....which i did feel bad about, (which lead to my pet frog which Ive had for almost a year lol, and when i see the little crickets run to the water dish to take a drink only to be snapped up by the frog i feel bad about that too)... but even though I did that i would not be able to feed a garter snake to any pet i may have...may sound stupid but its true. Also someone could say that the pet in question will only take other reptiles....well i would avoid such a pet but thats just me. to me its like feeding my cat to my dog (tempting sometimes...lol jk), but I do hunt, I have fed my snakes live animals soooo the real question is how do you determine which life is more important? (and yes I do kinda argue with myself over this lol) Bottom line is I think there is no right or wrong here but rather just a difference of opinion and if in the future if anyone needs to feed something a snake...send it to me instead and ill send you a frog or something in return lol

This thread reminded me of something that has come to mind lately, does anyone think there could be a group out there for people that love mice/rats/fish and they have a forum subject just for hating on us? Just a funny thought