How do you feed.....

[stonyloam]

80 baby garters, without going nuts? The short answer is you don't, but I do like a challenge. This is what I wound up doing and it seems to be working fairly well: Obviously catching enough worms the right size was out of the question, and I wanted them to start eating trout pieces, but they were not very interested. Decided to make a garter buffet. Took a trout fillet, froze it and used my razor saw (one of these thin Japanese saws) made some some 1-2 mm thick slices. Used a razor blade to make ~3mm strips, and then cut those crosswise to make a bunch of 2x2x3 mm chunks (easy when it's frozen). Then sliced up a nightcrawler into 2 mm segments (looked kinda like donuts) Put a bunch of the trout on a piece of paper and topped it off with nightcrawler pieces (including blood and guts), and kinda mixed it a little. Put it in the tank next to the hide, and lo and behold it worked, they chowed down on both the trout and worm pieces. Took hardly any time at all.

[Josh]

thanks terry im goona try that

[Josh]

do you have a local wal mart or bait shop?

[stonyloam]

There are bait shops around here, but a lot of places have bait vending machines where you can get worms. Our local K-Mart has one. You can even buy nightcrawlers over the internet. The trout fillets, I get at the local supermarket. You can get pinkies at a decent price from Rodentpro.com Frozen Feeder Rodents.

[enigma200316]

great to hear it Terry!!! glad it worked.......

[GarterGuy]

Sounds like the most "sane" way to go about that. I'd go nuts, I'm always worried that someone's not getting enough, so I end up feeding all mine seperately. A lot easier when you've only got 13 to worry about.

Roy

[stonyloam]

Sounds like the most "sane" way to go about that. I'd go nuts, I'm always worried that someone's not getting enough, so I end up feeding all mine seperately. A lot easier when you've only got 13 to worry about.

Roy

That is a concern, but I try to look them over and see if any are obviously skinnier. With that many I am going to have some that do not make it. Found one this morning, nothing obviously wrong with it but dead . It sure is fun watching the little guys eat.

[CrazyHedgehog]

cutting trout is surprizingly easy with scissors!!

[adamanteus]

Sounds like you've got a system going there, Terry!

[Sid]

Great news Terry. I don't have any where near as many babies, but I am going to try your idea on what I do have.