Mice make garters bigger then on worms?

[aSnakeLovinBabe]

I often wonder what are some of the underlying causes of stillborn, deformed/kinked babies, high amounts of jellybeans and etc. Over the many, many clutches of garters I have seen born I have never seen a kinked baby in the flesh yet! And it's just weird to me because I see that they occur once or twice a season in some other's collections but I still have never seen one!

I don't intentionally provide any of my snakes with UV lighting, and only the ones in certain enclosures get any direct lighting on their cage at all. My snakeroom gets rather hot with only a few bulbs and the rack system running. I don't give my gravid females extra heat and I don't allow them to over eat. Some garters do eat rodents in the wild, and some are much more aquatic but overall, they are all opportunistic and have a varied diet to some extent and that is why I continue to vary the diet. My garters appear to "enjoy" the variations anyways!

[BChambers]

All I can say is that, in many years of breeding marcianus, I've VERY seldom had a stillborn baby, nor anything but the very occasional infertile ova. I've never fed anything but rodents, and never provided UV lighting. My checkereds are kept exactly like my other colubrids-in rack systems with a heat-tape "hot spot" at one end.

After two decades, and hundreds of snakes bred, I think I can at least say that for this one species (T. marcianus), neither UV lighting nor a varied diet is either necessary or desirable (inasmuch as fish, worms and amphibians have a much greater potential of introducing harmful pathogens than frozen/thawed rodents).

I can't, of course, say anything about other species/ssp of which I have much less direct experience.

[aSnakeLovinBabe]

All I can say is that, in many years of breeding marcianus, I've VERY seldom had a stillborn baby, nor anything but the very occasional infertile ova. I've never fed anything but rodents, and never provided UV lighting. My checkereds are kept exactly like my other colubrids-in rack systems with a heat-tape "hot spot" at one end.

After two decades, and hundreds of snakes bred, I think I can at least say that for this one species (T. marcianus), neither UV lighting nor a varied diet is either necessary or desirable (inasmuch as fish, worms and amphibians have a much greater potential of introducing harmful pathogens than frozen/thawed rodents).

I can't, of course, say anything about other species/ssp of which I have much less direct experience.

Yea!!! now my question is, why does it happen to some people, but not others?! you and I both feed differently but get the same results!

[BChambers]

Yea!!! now my question is, why does it happen to some people, but not others?! you and I both feed differently but get the same results!

I don't know the answer to your question for sure, but as an educated guess-I'd say that, while a varied diet may not be necessary, it is also not necessarily harmful-and in many cases may be beneficial-as long as the keeper (like yourself) is extremely careful about the issues of parasite transmission and thiaminase.

I know you keep and breed red-striped ribbons, and I would NEVER recommend feeding that species a rodent-only diet!

[aSnakeLovinBabe]

I don't know the answer to your question for sure, but as an educated guess-I'd say that, while a varied diet may not be necessary, it is also not necessarily harmful-and in many cases may be beneficial-as long as the keeper (like yourself) is extremely careful about the issues of parasite transmission and thiaminase.

I know you keep and breed red-striped ribbons, and I would NEVER recommend feeding that species a rodent-only diet!

right now my holdback trio are getting a pinky or silverside strips every other feeding! The funny part is the first time I offered pinkies I did it without any scenting and they went CRAZY for them!!!

[BChambers]

right now my holdback trio are getting a pinky or silverside strips every other feeding! The funny part is the first time I offered pinkies I did it without any scenting and they went CRAZY for them!!!

Now that really surprises me -the ones from around here (Cibolo Creek, Kendall County, TX) turn up their noses at pinks!

[charles parenteau]

I give Uv light to gravid female that is very necessary at leat for the latter half of the pregnencie this is so important ,Uvb bulb is good and most of my snake have one.
BAd Food and lack of uv light are the main reasons for stillborn ,slugs ect.I Dont care about lighting for male.

Heating pad or rock are not good for gravid female should be avoid.

Uv fluorescent with and UVB bulb for heat are better .BUt do not overheat your female at the first stage of pregnencie .

UV light cant be replace by vitamine...better real uv than supplement.
uvb just provide heat ?..

[charles parenteau]

I was talking about sirtalis sirtalis,but dont really know about other species.

[BChambers]

I was talking about sirtalis sirtalis,but dont really know about other species.

It makes sense to me that your Quebec sirtalis may well find UV light very beneficial, while my marcianus do fine without it. Canadian sirtalis-indeed, all northern forms of Thamnophis, are primarily diurnal. They are adapted to lots of solar exposure due to the cold nights you experience, even in midsummer. Down here in Texas-and other hot, dry habitats- our garters don't dare show their faces when ol' sol is above the horizon! Most foraging, breeding etc is done at night.

Again, these things are easier to figure out if we look at how our snakes are living in a natural state.

[charles parenteau]

Right on,I agree with you.

I think that water snake and most garter snake should be feed with everything they eat in wild ,we denature their diet when giving rodent.
At first if you do the opposite of what they do in nature problems of any kind becomes inevitable.

Trout mixture is not found in nature but experience told me its better,this is the best alternative I think.DrBlais is in my mind a real master hes really on a other level,he was feeding his garter for years with rodent and he no longer doing this.I saw the change over the years.that enough to convice me .

Trout jellow can be as bad as rodent if you don't do it right,this is not mother nature ,its man made.Symptome for lack or overload of vitamine are almost the same.this method is not for everyone,only time will tell if you do it right.THat make big garter snake...but big garter snake don't mean healthy snake ,big litter ect,its just a big garter snake wich is cool...



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It makes sense to me that your Quebec sirtalis may well find UV light very beneficial, while my marcianus do fine without it. Canadian sirtalis-indeed, all northern forms of Thamnophis, are primarily diurnal. They are adapted to lots of solar exposure due to the cold nights you experience, even in midsummer. Down here in Texas-and other hot, dry habitats- our garters don't dare show their faces when ol' sol is above the horizon! Most foraging, breeding etc is done at night.

Again, these things are easier to figure out if we look at how our snakes are living in a natural state.