my Family members are killing garter snakes!!

How do I convince my parents and brother to not kill garter snakes around their house? My mother hates them because the wild snakes around their house are eating toads and biting people.
I went outside today to find them, no lie, SHOOTING them with air rifles and chopping them with shovels!!! I tried to get them to stop, then went inside, crying because of it. My husband went outside after they all left and found one little snake still alive. He thought he could save it, and came in the house to get something to put it in. when he went back and realized it had been cut too. All in all, they killed about 50 garters. I am still mad that they did that!! and I don't know how I am going to prevent it from happening again.....

I love the way some people defend the reasons they kill wild animals and the biting people reason is hilarious. I guess they're biting ankles? If not, then why are the hands dragging the ground unless they're a gorilla?

There is no way to stop ignorant people from killing snakes or any animal for that matter. The only thing you can do is try to educate them on the fact that these snakes are completely harmless no matter how many "bites" they get.

Recently at the pet store I work at a customer came running in the store saying that a rather large guy was creating a rucous in the parking lot because there was a humongous snake in the weight room of the fitness center in the same complex that our store is in. I go down there thinking that maybe I should have taken a snake stick just in case it was a humongous snake. The guy who was freaking out is a body builder. He had no shirt on and man did he have muscles.

I get in the weight room and he is sticking his head in the door screaming that it's in the corner. Well the only thing in the corner for this "humongous" snake to hide under is a weight belt and the weight that the idiot threw at the snake. It turns out this humongous snake was about an 18" yellow belly racer. He hit it with a weight and all but severed it's tail. The hemipenes were hanging out. I grabbed the snake as it was trying to get away and it bit me several times.

I thought that the body builder guy was gonna pass out. He was completely freaking out acting like a little girl. I wish I could have gotten it on film. It was truly amazing. I said something like you f'ing idiot you killed it. Next time you see a baby snake, just call me and I'll save it from you. He was still freaking out because it had bit me several times. I had to tell him that it wasn't venomous and nothing would come of the bites to my hand. The thing was simply trying to defend itself.

I asked the moron what exactly he thought that snake was going to do to him. He said he had no idea but he was sure it would KILL him. Now come on. You can't get more idiotic than that. When more people are killed in car accidents than by any animal, why are people still afriad of little snakes? I can't figure it out.

They are also overly concerned that the snakes are going to start biting and attacking my 2 year old. This is from the same person who thinks our corn snakes are just the prettiest things ever!! I am to the point where I want tostart catching all the garters here and keep them or relocate them.

sorry about the double posts-My mother calls all toads here "Hers" and gets mad when the snakes eat one.

There is only one toad I would be upset if died, and it is a huge one tat appeard 15 years ago, and when we first found him, I named him Georgie. lol

Its not that easy to change peoples minds about things like this. My mom is terrified of snakes and even though she will come into my shop she is always nervous in the reptile section. My parents live on a 40 acre lot surrounded by hundreds of wooded acres. There are plenty of garter snakes around ans she has a hard time hanging laundry on the line in the summer. I know she won't kill a snake because she won't shoot a gun, can't throw a rock worth a damn, and I don't think they have any 50' poles that she could lift but if my dad is around she screams (literally) for him to do it. If she is around, he has no choice. If he sees one by himself he leaves it alone but as he has told me several times "you'd kill one too if you had to live with her" I remember relocating about 20 babies one spring as they were just emerging from the railroad tie wall around the flower garden where they had obviously been born. My mom didn't say much since she knew I would not kill them and she knew I would relocate them far enough away. When I stopped by two days later however there was not a railroad tie to be seen on the place and my dad was exhausted. He said she had him out there ripping them up as soon as I had left. He didn't find any more snakes though.

No offense Karen, and I know that it was probably just your emotions getting carried away but I have learned that making fun of people and their phobias is not the right way to go about changing their minds. We all know there is nothing to be afraid of but they don't. Calling them morons and idiots will do little to convince them. Next time the bodybuilder will probably to a better job killing the snake rather than call the "uppity b**ch" from the pet shop who made fun of him. Espescially someone as shallow and with as fragile of an ego as a bodybuilder Sorry, I couldn't resist. I used to be one myself untill I got lazy and started college. You know what, I'm pretty sure that the experts are wrong and all that muscle does turn to fat

Steve

I used to live next door to a body builder. This guy did NOT like snake at all when I first moved in. But his curiosity eventually got the better of him. We were neighbors for about a year and he never really got to like them but did think that some were really pretty. His ego would not let him pass on the attempt to pet one when his girlfried was fearless.

You may want to try converting him. Tell him you'll bring a baby snake, and stress that it's a baby, just for him to look at. Then take over a baby ball python, one that is a scardy-cat and just let it sit in your hand, all curled up. That's it for the first time. Tell him it's more afraid of him than he is of it and if he'd like to see it again, you'll work on getting to not be so afraid of people and bring it back in a few days.

It's worked before, hopefully it will again.

What ticked me off the most about that idiot bodybuilder was the way he was acting. I have seen hundreds of people who have snake phobias yet NONE acted like this guy. He acted like a complete moron. He just wouldn't shut up the entire time I was trying to get the snake out of the weight room. There were no other people around to witness this guy's act, just me, so he saved himself even more embarassment by being the only other person there. Later he came in the shop saying that snake was one of ours that got loose. That ticked me off even more. IMO the dude got what he deserved! I just wish there had been a bunch of bystanders watching him.

Also I've been trying to catch one of these snakes since last year and they're simply too fast for me to catch. Heck I almost didn't catch this one and it had it's hemipenes hanging out! It's also known as a blue racer. It's back is a pretty shade of blue.

wilomn said:

You may want to try converting him.

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Umm I think I burned that bridge last week. LOL I was so mad that I said a lot of things I NEVER would have said, especially to a stranger as large as that guy was.

Senseless killing ticks me off more than anything and that guy wouldn't stop screaming so I popped off my mouth too. Picture this, if he had been a lot smaller, I would have slapped his face to try to get him to shut up. It was that bad.

I've converted several people in the store with the same trick, a timid BP, especially a teeny weeny bb that barely covers the palm of your hand.

Man Wiloman, it's getting scary at how much I think like you, really scary! My bandwagon must travel next to yours!

Karen Hulvey said:

Man Wiloman, it's getting scary at how much I think like you, really scary! My bandwagon must travel next to yours!

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Watch out for the Koolaid then. It won't kill you but being as I am a looooongtime Deadhead, you will some some WAY COOL colours if you drink it.

Ahh the Dead. I have seen every band imagineable but I regret that I never got to see the Dead when Jerry was alive!

Can you name my favorite tune?

A peaceful place or so it looks from space. A closer look reveals the human race. Full of hope, full of grace is the human face but afraid we may lay our home to waste.

There's a fear down here we can't forget. Hasn't got a name just yet.
Always awake, always around singin' ashes, ashes all fall down. Ashes, ashes, all fall down.

I could but I'm too busy at The Cumberland Mine, just down the road From Terrapin Station waiting for the Morning Dew with my Spanish Lady, lamenting the fact that He's Gone, sort of humming Blues for Allah, hoping there is no Cold Rain and Snow as I keep in Truckin on down to where Black Peter will be panhandling as Uncle John's Band warms up to play at St. Stephans. Pretty much just One More Saturday Night.

Ya know?

Karen Hulvey said:

Ahh the Dead. I have seen every band imagineable but I regret that I never got to see the Dead when Jerry was alive!

Can you name my favorite tune?

A peaceful place or so it looks from space. A closer look reveals the human race. Full of hope, full of grace is the human face but afraid we may lay our home to waste.

There's a fear down here we can't forget. Hasn't got a name just yet.
Always awake, always around singin' ashes, ashes all fall down. Ashes, ashes, all fall down.

Click to expand...

Yeah, definitely can't blame any of you, the people in both of these scenarios sound roughly the same as the kinds of people who thought hanging other people from trees was okay, really. I'm sure if you went and kicked their dog as hard as you could, they'd start screaming, asking why you kicked their dog, maybe cry a little. So, why then should they not treat every other animal the same way? It's still an animal. Now, if the snake in the weight room with the meathead was a viper, or something that could have actually killed him? I might have understood his reaction in the story, but all it would've taken to know what snakes are poisonous in his state is go online and google it, look at pictures, and familiarize himself with what to look for.
Example: I know copperheads are prevalent from where I'm from...so I'm extremely careful in tall grassy areas, woods, rocky areas, etc. just in case. And I'm always listening for that telltale rattle.

Being comfortable with snakes

I've had the same issue with my parents and sister being uncomfortable with snakes. I remember when I was young, and since my mom was afraid of snakes she'd have the garters around our house chopped.(fortunately, she only saw 3 garters, because after the first were chopped I'd scare them away when she was near) began to like snakes and I found out that the best way for your family to at least not KILL or THREATEN reptiles is to give them experience with a reptile. Start with one family member and move up one by one. So I showed my dad that snakes weren't that bad and they were calm, and my mom seeing that my dad was ok with snakes, she grew away from her fear. And then just keep letting or showing how good reptiles are without scaring your family members too much where they go back into their fear.