Please help me with my garter snake!

[Mecca01]

beautiful snake!!

[kibakiba]

Almost all of my snakes are wild caught, not just Hades. Runt was the most nervous snake I've had. She didn't want anything to do with me, and if you picked her up, she's spazz and then go limp. I ended up leaving her alone other than feeding, from a dish. She started calming down more. Squirt was the same way.

[RedSidedSPR]

But see, that's spazzy snakes. Mine and this one, aren't.

Look, I'm not saying your wrong. Maybe it's species. I was just regarding my experience and the fact that my snake benefited from the interaction like that.

Like i said, that's just me.

[kibakiba]

Squirt was not at all spazzy when I got her.

[J@50n]

Something that helped my snake get used to me was taking out everything in the tank but the water and substrate. Then just placing my hand palm up in the bottom on the tank (palm up so he/she can move through your fingers and slither over your hand to get used to you). That way my snake would come and check out my hand, then gradually I began holding him and interacting with him more and more, until he would let me just grab him right out of his tank without running away from me.

If you are still worried about the feeding, place a little dish in the aquarium somewhere, add a tiny bit of water, get a night crawler, cut it up into inch sized pieces, put all the inch sized pieces in that wet dish, and he will smell all the blood and guts and hopefully will come running to the dish That's what mine does anyway, I put in his food, leave his tank for about 10 minutes, come back and he's over it and there's only about 2 worm pieces left

Make sure to use Night crawlers though as the compost worms / trout worms / red wrigglers are toxic!

[guidofatherof5]

Good advice Jason.

[amcutem]

beautiful snake!!

Thank you

[amcutem]

I checked him out yesterday and this morning and he seems to be done hidding behind the box. Now he's chilling out under the leaves right in front of the tperware pond, and that made me happy. I really wanted to grab him but I didnt.

It would be nice if one day all i had to do was put my hand in the auarium and he would go to my hands by himself. That would be so cool.

Sometimea i want to let him snake around the floor, but I dont think thats a very good idea. The other day, i was holding him but I let go for a second and zooooom, he was gone- under the dresser and then under the bed. Good thing i had the IQ to block the vent on the floor. I caught him back, but i learned my lesson.

Sometimes I wonder if he's too small not to be scared of anything bigger than him, especially me.

[RedSidedSPR]

Sometimea i want to let him snake around the floor, but I dont think thats a very good idea. The other day, i was holding him but I let go for a second and zooooom, he was gone- under the dresser and then under the bed. Good thing i had the IQ to block the vent on the floor. I caught him back, but i learned my lesson.

That's kinda what i meant, about him being stressed. He's going through alot. that would have really panicked him, so he's not gonna eat. NOt that you did anything wrong

I feed my snakes on the floor, its possible, just may take awhile.

[d_virginiana]

I checked him out yesterday and this morning and he seems to be done hidding behind the box. Now he's chilling out under the leaves right in front of the tperware pond, and that made me happy. I really wanted to grab him but I didnt.

It would be nice if one day all i had to do was put my hand in the auarium and he would go to my hands by himself. That would be so cool.

Sometimea i want to let him snake around the floor, but I dont think thats a very good idea. The other day, i was holding him but I let go for a second and zooooom, he was gone- under the dresser and then under the bed. Good thing i had the IQ to block the vent on the floor. I caught him back, but i learned my lesson.

Sometimes I wonder if he's too small not to be scared of anything bigger than him, especially me.

I think that's why a lot of young snakes are jumpy; heck, I'm jumpy around really tiny snakes because of their size! I'm afraid I'm going to break them, ad I'm sure they're afraid of the same thing

Hm.. It may just be because I handfeed mine, but if I tap lightly on the side of the tank to get their attention, and then wriggle one of my fingers (outside the cage) they'll get really curious and come right over to it and even follow my hand along the edge of the tank. That really helped my little one get used to me and stop panicking whenever anyone got near her.

Just keep working with him; sounds like he's already starting to get more more comfortable in his home.