New to snakes

[drache]

welcome to this forum, Chris
when you mentioned the garters living in your siding, I immediately thought of Terry, a forum member who has them visiting his sun room
you might enjoy this thread:
http://www.thamnophis.com/forum/gene...ng-snakes.html
Rex seems to have found a very nice dossing pad

[Lori P]

Welcome, and hope you enjoy it here! Sounds like Rex knew right where to go to spend a leisurely winter!!!

[rex]

Thanks Rhea, that was cool. I might consider putting a light in the crawl space to see what happens. Happy New Year!

[rex]

Hi Kris, and welcome to the forum.
Forget the crickets, Garters don't eat them, alive or dead. The best type of worms to use are night-crawlers. You might also want to use fish and mouse pinkies as staple foods. You'll find a lot of useful information to get you started right here:
http://www.thamnophis.com/caresheets...ake_Care_Sheet
Hope you enjoy it here, and maybe hold on to Rex, even after the spring warm-up!
By the way, what species is Rex? Where in the US are you?

We live in Illinois and believe Rex is a Common Garter. We do enjoy having him. Quite a curious snake, always sticking his head out when he feels us walking down the hall towards the room he's in. He's also a nice snake, nervous when we handle him but has never tried to strike us. Don't know about keeping him in the spring. I think he'd be much happier in the garden or wood pile with the snakes out there.

Thanks for the info.

Happy New Year.

Kris

[ssssnakeluvr]

he is probably an eastern garter in that area. use normal nightcrawlers....you can also catch the small worms in your yard, we call them angleworms, they are smaller than nightcrawlers and are all pink, no purple head end. if the red worms are what i think, red wrigglers, they are toxic to snakes. oh, and welcome to the forum....pictures would also be nice!!! we love pictures!!!!