Telling the age of garters?

[RedSidedSPR]

How do you tell the age of a garter? Is there a surefire way, or do you just have to guess? I have a male (I'm guessing) red sided garter, but I caught him myself so there's no way to tell his age that I know of. And how soon does a garter (male) supposedly stop growing? I know they never stop, but how long until they are "fully grown"? He's 20inchs right now.
If it helps I can get pictures.
It's not that important to me, but it would be nice to know.

[guidofatherof5]

Knowing the age of a wild caught snakes is difficult unless you catch it as a baby.
The wild life is hard/rough on them(shorter life)
Here's the kind of photos needed for sexing.
http://www.thamnophis.com/forum/bree...xing-pics.html

[ConcinusMan]

You can't really tell like Steve says. You can usually tell if they are yearlings or younger, or if they are elderly, but that's about it. Size alone doesn't usually mean a whole lot. I have two CB radix siblings that were the same size when I got them. Now one is twice the size of the other. If I were trying to guess by looking at them, I'd say one is about a year old, and the other is about 4 or 5 months. I would be wrong about the smaller one and only "in the ballpark" with the other.

Likewise, if I had released some of last years concinnus babies, there's no way they would be as big today as the pampered, well fed captives are. Like Steve was saying, it's rough out there for them. They aren't necessarily going to grow as big, or at the same rate as captive snakes would.

[RedSidedSPR]

That's what I thought. It seems like he's (thanks, Steve, he's a male for sure) young, since he isn't all that big, and since he's grown 4 1/2inchs in 4 months...but that probably dosn't mean anything.

[ConcinusMan]

Actually, it kinda does mean something. That growth rate does suggest that he's young. Probably not more than 2 years old. They do slow down considerably after that.

[RedSidedSPR]

That's what I thought. I figured it would mean he's young. So an estimated 2 years would be a good guess?
(heres some pix just in case it helps)

[Stefan-A]

How do you tell the age of a garter? Is there a surefire way, or do you just have to guess?

There is a surefire way, but it's not practical: Skeletochronology.

[RedSidedSPR]

do I see a "skeleton" in there somewhere? No thanks!

[Stefan-A]

do I see a "skeleton" in there somewhere? No thanks!

Yes. This is literally cutting the thing in half and counting the rings.

[ConcinusMan]

I don't think anyone wants to know that badly but hey, I'll keep that in mind for when big bertha kicks the bucket.