Why are garters underrated?

[snakehill]

Sorry Steve!!!

[Kantar]

I'm also a member of Manitoba Herpetocultural Society Forums and they are all "OMG NO NO" about garters. When they got a new forum they put in a garter snake section pretty much for me but then the forum activity is next to none so then I found thamnophis.com (best find ever).

They are pretty much corn snake, boa and python people

[jitami]

Maybe I'll explain... Amon is surely able to kill a mouse, hell, he's constricting frozen mice, but I just can't imagine I would give him an opportunity to eat litte ball of fur, not to mention possible dangers of feeding with live mice. Unfortunately, he (my friend, that is) claims that he'll buy a corn snake...

Yeah, it's a macho sort of thing with your friend, I guess. A live mouse large enough for a corn snake can actually do a lot of damage to the snake... but guys like this typically don't care. Hmmm... maybe he can find one that won't eat frozen for someone else anyway. Your friend gets his childish thrill and the snake eats the only thing it would have eaten anyway?

[snakehill]

I'm also a member of Manitoba Herpetocultural Society Forums and they are all "OMG NO NO" about garters. When they got a new forum they put in a garter snake section pretty much for me but then the forum activity is next to none so then I found thamnophis.com (best find ever).

They are pretty much corn snake, boa and python people

That's a shame! You seem to be the only one that posts!

[RedSidedSPR]

He's the only one to start a thread... Pitiful. Maybe you should make a thread like this one, there...

[d_virginiana]

Geez, I leave the internet for a day and like five 7 page threads pop up out of nowhere!

I've never understood why people don't like garters as much as other snakes. They're easy to house together since they don't cannibalize, and make great display animals. They come in all sorts of bright, 'designer' colors. Mainly, they have so much personality.. I've never seen another type of snake as curious and outgoing toward people. I'm interested in pythons and all (goodness, I've spent wayy too much time drooling over some of the beautiful blood pythons on kinsnake.com...) but if I had to choose only one type of snake to keep, it'd easily be garters.

[guidofatherof5]

Some of it's the fact that many snake keepers think that garters are kid's snakes, beginner's snakes.
Garter snake are also fast. A slower snake is easier to handle.
Having a garter snake in your hand isn't as impressive as having a BIG snake.
Just some of my thoughts.

[Millinex]

Multiple reasons from what I can gather.

1. The view of them as beginner snakes.
2. Availability- why work with garters, when most people who want one, will just go catch one.
3. 0 market- literally, the market is pretty rough, it's doable but I can honestly sell 10 corns/balls for ever 1 garter I sell.
4. Lack of knowledge, people have them as kids, musking all over, probably dieing quickly- and don't see the reason to invest in them.

[d_virginiana]

So true.. I feel like most people that catch one thinking they've just got a free pet end up releasing the jumpy, musky snake and never wanting another garter or they have no clue what they're doing and end up killing it. Either way it probably doesn't make them want to run out and pay to have another shipped to their house. On the bright side, there aren't nearly as many garters wasting away in hell-holes like Petsmart either...

Regardless, I can't think of another type of snake I'd rather have as a display animal. Pythons are nice, but they just sit around alot. It's nearly impossible to have a conversation in my snake room because every thirty seconds someone has to go "Awww, look, they're doing something cute!".

[guidofatherof5]

It's nearly impossible to have a conversation in my snake room because every thirty seconds someone has to go "Awww, look, they're doing something cute!".

Never a dull moment with the little buggers.
Well, just not very many.