Grass Snake (natrix natrix)

[Gene0514]

Hi everyone
Haven't been on in a while. My garter is doing great.
Today I attended the hamburg reptile expo in Pennsylvania. And when I was there, I noticed someone selling European grass snakes. Being from Russia originally, I've heard that they are like the most common snake there. I did read up on them before, so I decided to get one. I asked the vendor where he got them from, and he said he had them shipped from germany. They were being sold for only $10.

So here it is. Looking at the tail, i think its a female, but i'm not sure how accurate that is in snakes that young.




Does anyone have any experience with this species?

[guidofatherof5]

Beautiful snake.

[Gene0514]

Thanks!

[katach]

I love the natrix! I thought they were protected though? Beautiful anyway though!

[aSnakeLovinBabe]

I scored 8 of these little beauties today. it was like the best show ever for me! Because of these natrix I thought I would never find them for sale in the US again!!! They are actually quite difficult to pop/sex as babies, I got a quantity to ensure mixed sexes and I cherry picked some reaaaalllly nice ones!!! I will not be keeping them all permanently, but I had to grab a bunch to ensure success. They are very easy snakes to work with, I have worked/ already work with natrix, they will eat anything! Keep them exactly like a garter. They have the same personality, curious, always hungry, semi aquatic and even a little mischievous! Btw, they are cb 2011 German imports.

[chris-uk]

Natrix natrix helvetica is protected in the UK. Not sure about other European subspecies in other countries. However, the protection it has isnt so tight that it cant be kept in captivity, you need to be licensed to trade them, but no license required to own one.
You don't see many of them in the wild nowdays.I would feel jealous, if I wasnt seriously condidering adding a San Fran to our menagerie. I love the colouring of the grass snake, understated and pretty.

[Thamnophis]

In the Netherlands keeping (or disturbing) the Grass snake is forbidden. In Germany you can keep them when you have some kind of prove that it was born in captivity.
I took care of some during a few years in a reptile zoo and I can only say that taking care of them in captivity is not different than the general care of Thamnophis. They ate fish (smelt and filet), but also chickenparts from the tweezers. They are shy in the beginning, but settle down after a while. And I am speaking about wild caught specimen. So captive born specimen will do even better, I presume.
I let them hibernate during three to four months. They stopped eating by them self when it became colder.
I really would like to keep some at home, but that is not possible in the Netherlands

[PINJOHN]

i kept grassnakes during the sixty's and later, at that time they could be caught legally in Britain and i got some from north wales but found them very difficult to acclimatize which fits with the reputation for the British sub species, however at that time and for many years after the pet shops were filled with the Italian sub species which was a doddle to get used to captivity, so most of my experience was with the Italian type, i did get my hands on eight Russian grassnakes about twenty years ago maybe a little less [the memory isn't what it was] and three of them were melenistic.
from what i could find out at the time, this was a not an uncommon trait from certain parts of Russia [this was pre internet so information was hard won at this time], keeping grassnakes and some tessellater lead me into garters as they became available.

[infernalis]

I have always wanted one....

[d_virginiana]

Beautiful snake! I want one now...