T. eques cuitzeoensis behaviour

[chris-uk]

Everything back where it belongs on Vlad?

Looked like it, he seems to be slithering OK without any unwanted friction. :-D
Is there any special attention to give them after the act? Obviously I was joking about providing Vlad with cigarettes, but is there anything to look out for other than Vlad's tackle in the wrong place?

[guidofatherof5]

As long as the hemipenis has retracted and is back in its garage he should be fine.
He'll be ready to go again right about...........now.

[Char361979]

The poor litle fella looks like he needs lotion to sooth his bits and pieces. Poor Vlad.

[johnc79@hotmail.com]

How are they both doing? Did you seperate them in the end? Dont forget there only last years so its not good if she gets pregnant .

[chris-uk]

They're both doing OK, eating well from a bowl of salmon when I leave them to it. They aren't keen on tong feeding yet, but I think I'll get them there soon. Both are still a bit skittish, slowly getting used to the new home. The male is actually slightly happier to be handled and Char had him out for almost an hour on Friday, and I had the female out for about 15 minutes yesterday.
We've not been able to separate them. It's a case of not having space for an extra viv at the moment (I've got a 3' in the loft, which we'll be able to use once my dad has built a shelving unit for our ExoTerras), so to separate them we'd need to risk having one of them in with our baby checkereds in a smaller viv. Ideally they wouldn't have shown any interest until next year, at 16 months they are young but if they weren't captive nature has decided that she is mature to breed. They haven't shown any interest in courting apart from the one time. Not ideal, but we weren't expecting to have to consider breeding issues until next year, so playing it by ear a bit.

[guidofatherof5]

I think it's great that you have the opportunity to work with this species.
All photos are much appreciated.

[chris-uk]

Photos at the moment are all a bit fuzzy - either they aren't keeping still (I have several deleted photos of rapidly retreating snakes), or when they are still the photos are taken through glass in generally poor light, or snapped on my phone because that was in my hand.

tec-lacramosa-1.jpg
Here's on of Lacrimosa that isn't too bad to keep you going.

[johnc79@hotmail.com]

What about the rub you collected them in? The male would be fine in there for a while. I'm not interfering it's just I'd be gutted if anything happend to them. Even next year would be to soon. There a larger garter snake than others. My female is 09 and I'm not going to breed her untill next year. I keep all mine in single sex groups. If nature has her sexually mature at 16 months still does not mean she could cope with pregnancy . Like I say I'm not interfering but I do feel responsible if she dies as she is only half grown. I'm sure most people would agree it's not ideal.

[johnc79@hotmail.com]

Thinking about it I have a spair viv I could lend you if that helps?

[chris-uk]

No, I don't see you interfering John, we're still learning about snakes so advice is all useful. Fair point about her coping with the pregnancy despite being mature enough to mate. These guys are unique enough to warrant some caution, so we'll split them up as soon as possible.

It's not so much the viv, it's the space to put the viv. I'm visiting my dad at the weekend, he's a handyman and has the tools to build cabinets, so my plan is to get him to build some shelves to sit on top of the unit that the 2' viv is currently sat on, and have doubledecker 2' vivs (I've got a plan to build something modular that will allow another 2' to be stcked on top later). I'm sure once I've given him some plans to work from at the weekend I'll have a custom shelf unit in a week or two. If they seem "frisky" in the meantime I'll look at pulling Vlad out into the RUB.