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Immaculate conception?

HeavenHell

HeavenHell

Okeetee Freak
Some of you may recall that I helped remove several foxsnakes and a garter snake from a man's base late last fall. I removed snakes on two different occasions. The last trip was too late in the fall to release the snakes, daytime temps were in the 40's, so I kept them in my cool basement. I bought the garter upstairs in late February to warm up. It readily took pinkies up until about a month ago. I noticed that even though it wasn't eating, it was getting fatter and fatter. So I suspected it might be gravid, even though it hasn't had any contact with any other snake since last November. I decided to hold onto the snake a bit longer to see what happened. Well to make a long story short, it's giving birth (live birth) this morning. So far I see six little squigglies with more on the way. So apparently this snake retained sperm from it's last mating encounter. I'll post some family photos when she's done.
 
How exciting! Wouldn't it be funny to return and say, here's your snakes back! Just kidding. Can't wait to see the babies.
 
I just checked my field guide and it says they have between 10-25 young once a year. I see an even dozen so far, and I don't think she's quite done yet. It's been a crazy year for snakes and it's still only May.
 
That's really neat. I was wondering with live-bearing snakes, do they ever give birth to dead or deformed babies?
 
Can't wait to see the babies! What would you feed hatchlings (? what is the term for young from live bearing snakes?) that small?
 
I think a few still birth are not uncommon. I haven't got a total yet, as she's still not done. The hatchlings should take night crawler parts.
 
That is awesome!
When I was about 12, my brother and I were given a large garter snake by some neighbors and we kept her for a little over a year, until the week that she refused to eat and we walked in to the room one day to see 11 little garter snakes all over the cage! That was enough for my mom, who wasn't super thrilled with the snake to begin with and she made us let them all go in the nearby marshy area. But the female garter had 11 live babies and if I remember right, two slugs. The slugs look kind of like largish yellow jelly beans and I guess the momma snake will often eat them, so she might have had more than the two we found.
 
16 healthy babies, 2 still-borns. Mom snake still appears to be contracting so there may be 1 more left.
 
Here's one of the babies. The other 15 look pretty much the same. :) I attempted to photograph like five of them and ended up bashing my head against the wall. :twohammer They have no interest in sitting still now that they've been released into the big bad world.


MJD_1319_1024_title1 by heavensherps, on Flickr
 
You are the luckiest guy ever.

What a precious picture! If my girls saw them, I'd go deaf from the high-pitched squeals!
 
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