Mike's Garters

[mikem]

I'm catching up with you!

[EasternGirl]

You have actually surpassed my collection! When you came to my house, you had no garters...you left Delaware with 2 and now you have more than I do!

[BLUESIRTALIS]

Hey Mike i may make it up that way this weekend and if i do i'll call you. Those are some nice looking similis man!

More garters! Columbia repticon was fun. Met up with Bluesirtalis and chatted a bit. Super nice guy and lives fairly close by, so hopefully we can get together for some herping soon! Looking forward to it!

male T.s.similis

female T.s.similis

male T.marcianus

female T.marcianus

[mikem]

Thanks! They need some weight on them, but other than that, they're awesome. Definitely call me

[mikem]

My male similis dropped dead. He was fine Saturday and dead Sunday. The female was also on the edge of death Sunday and I wasn't expecting her to make it over night. Yesterday morning I opened her cage, expecting her to have passed and she was like a little firecracker. Totally normal. She went from a limp noodle to full of life in one night. I've never seen anything like it. She even ate a night crawler and two pinks. I'm gonna have to invest in some meds if I'm going to purchase wild caught animals. They both were pretty thin when I got them. Hoping the female continues to thrive. I'll keep you guys updated.

[BLUESIRTALIS]

Hey Mike sorry for your loss on the male similis. I hope the female continues to progress for you.

[ConcinusMan]

I got a contact on facebook that is catching some really nice blue/green garters in Florida but I think they're FL blue's, not similis' since he's in So FL. He's been bugging me to buy some (cheap). I'm tempted.

You're right about perhaps learning how to dose for worms, and getting some meds to have on hand, if you're going to be buying WC snakes. Most sellers don't bother and then you get all kinds of problems. The symptoms you're describing sounds like a heavy parasite load. Combine that with the stress of being captured and perhaps not kept under the best of conditions, and you will likely have problems, even if the snake didn't have any real health problems from the parasites when it was still in the wild. It's having that parasite load and then combining it with the stress / captivity, then the heavy load starts causing problems.


This is why WC gets a bad rap. Some people flat refuse to buy them, but what they don't realize is, if you properly quarantine and observe for health problems for a few weeks, and deworm them right, they really end up being just as good, if not better (better genes, better hardiness) than CB snakes. I don't know what kind of bad experience these people have had with buying WC snakes, but in my experience, once they are screened and dewormed, I have few problems with them. Now CB in my experience, can come with plenty of problems too. They are no less likely to have issues than WC , in my opinion. In fact, many CB lines seem inferior to me in many ways.

[Steveo]

Sorry for your loss, Mike.

[Steveo]

This is why WC gets a bad rap. Some people flat refuse to buy them, but what they don't realize is, if you properly quarantine and observe for health problems for a few weeks, and deworm them right, they really end up being just as good, if not better (better genes, better hardiness) than CB snakes. I don't know what kind of bad experience these people have had with buying WC snakes, but in my experience, once they are screened and dewormed, I have few problems with them. Now CB in my experience, can come with plenty of problems too. They are no less likely to have issues than WC , in my opinion. In fact, many CB lines seem inferior to me in many ways.

I think the biggest problem is when you have both. On the one hand, you have CB snakes that are healthy but perhaps weak genetically. Certainly we raise some snakes which wouldn't have survived in the wild, and we do it in a relatively sterile environment with few immunological challenges. Then a WC snake carrying who-knows-what enters the picture. Proper use of aseptic technique can virtually eliminate cross-contamination, but proper aseptic technique can eat up a lot of time and energy; I've been doing it with my WC vagrans and her two remaining offspring, but since I ordered a bunch of scrubs it's getting tiring and rather than risk losing everyone I'm going to release them. I'm sure the vagrans would live long and healthy lives in captivity, but I don't know that my CB snakes could stand up to their parasite load and I don't really care to find out.

[Invisible Snake]

My male similis dropped dead. He was fine Saturday and dead Sunday. The female was also on the edge of death Sunday and I wasn't expecting her to make it over night. Yesterday morning I opened her cage, expecting her to have passed and she was like a little firecracker. Totally normal. She went from a limp noodle to full of life in one night. I've never seen anything like it. She even ate a night crawler and two pinks. I'm gonna have to invest in some meds if I'm going to purchase wild caught animals. They both were pretty thin when I got them. Hoping the female continues to thrive. I'll keep you guys updated.

I'm sorry for your loss. Was he eating regularly? Besides parasites anything else that may have caused his death?