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Short Stuff: Garter Snakes · Stuff You Should Know

• 0:04
  Speaker 1: Hey, welcome to the short stuff. I'm Josh, and there's
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: Chuck and Jerry's over there sitting him for Dave, who's
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: editing this. Hey Dave, um Dave, And this means say
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: hey Dave. Everybody. No, Dave's not allowed to talk either.
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: We can't play favorites. No. No, I'm telling the listeners
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: to say hi to Dave. No. I don't even know. Well,
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: let's just forget all that and just start with the
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: short stuff about the harmless garter snake, who is not
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: only harmless, is actually helpful, especially if you garden. That's right.
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: I love garter snakes. I love it when I happened
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: upon them. I love to pick them up and hold
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: them for a second before I release them back into
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: the wild very gently. Do you nuzzle them? Sure? I
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: had one bite me once, really where just like on
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: the finger. You know, it's cute. It's an adorable little
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: attempt at a bite. This one was really little, and
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: I was just like, look at you. You think you're
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: all tough, right, And I acted like I was scared.
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: I was like, oh, and I put it down just
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: so it felt good about itself. That. Wow, that was
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: really kind of you. They will a little harmless garter
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: snake will try and bite you because that is a
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: snake is gonna snake. But um, for many many years
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: they thought like they had no toxicity whatsoever, but they
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: actually do have toxic, neurotoxic venom. It's just it's adorable
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: because it's so little of it and it's so mild
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: that it doesn't even harm a human. Now, if you're
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: like a little tiny mouse field mouse, you probably don't
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: find it very adorable because it'll mess you up. But yeah,
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: as far as humans are concerned, unless you have a
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: very rare and specific allergy to garter snake venom. Even then,
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: from what I saw, I think the worst you're gonna
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: face is a skin irritation at the bite site. But
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: for the most you did you're like, oh my gosh,
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: this allergy my hand is Yeah, that snake was like,
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: but this little chest out he's very happy. Um. So yeah,
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: for the most part, they're just not going to hurt
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: you when there when if you're a human. But even
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: even more than that, garter snakes are notoriously shy. They
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: don't want to have anything to do with you. They
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: don't want to try to get near you. They don't
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: want to try and hurt your pet or your kid
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: or anything. They just want to kind of coexist peacefully
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: and remotely from you in your yard, in your garden,
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: and again to kind of help you out. Yeah, and
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: it saysn't here and we'll talk about where they got
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: their name. But it says that there are sometimes erroneously
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: called garden snakes. I don't think that's erroneous. I think
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: that can just be a sort of a common name
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: for him, since you find him in the garden. I
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: don't think anyone thinks that's the official scientific name they.
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: I will tell you who thinks it's wrong, Doug Wells
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: or Wexler wildlife biologists. Who says who gives the most
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: improbable explanation for the name garter snake I've ever heard? Actually?
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: Which one is improbable to you? The fact that the
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: stripes resemble the garters that men used to wear as
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: sock garters used to I've got guarters on right now.
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: It's like Krusty the clown. He's trying to be relatable.
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: He's like, yeah, when your butler doesn't get all the
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: schmutz off of your socks, garters said No, not quite that. Yeah, that, um,
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: I guess it does seem a little improbable. I think
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: the other one makes a little more sense is that
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: the German word for garden is garden, and it might
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: have been just a different or you know, corruption I
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: guess of that German version. Yeah, which would make sense
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: because again, these are like a gardner's best friend. In
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: the United States, sometimes they're called gardeners snakes anyway, So
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: I would find that more likely than the sock garter
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: story that Weckler's peddling. Agreed, And you know, it's not
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: like he wrote a book called garter Snakes. Oh wait
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: a minute, he did? He did? I feel bad if
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: this gets back to him. I'm sure it's a great book, Doug. Yeah,
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: well done. Yeah, you can get it. It's published by
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: Power Kids back in two thousand one, and it's probably
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: basically evergreen. Plus, it's not like he's just a slouch
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: to He's he's um with the Academy of Natural Sciences
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: at Drexel University in Philly, so he's not just some guy.
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: You know. It's just promoting a terrible, terrible explanation for
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: where this artist snake gets its name. Should we take
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: a break, I think, so all right, let's do it.
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: All right, Here's what surprised me about the garter snake
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: is that it is the state reptile of Massachusetts. That
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: is very surprising. Did not know that. And they're all
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: over North America, from Canada to Florida. Um. Probably one
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: of the most abundant and common snakes in North America. Yeah,
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: and it's particularly abundant in the Eastern US, but it
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: goes all the way from the Atlantic to the Pacific.
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: It's just everywhere. Um, America's snake. And they're very frequently
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: in places that you have no idea. Again, they kind
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: of try to stay away as much as possible. They're
• 5:30
  Speaker 1: fairly small. They usually are about anywhere from eighteen inches
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: to fifty four inches, which is under five feet UM.
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: They're very light. Uh, they weighed like less than half
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: a pound typically. They're just tiny little snakes. And then
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: they've got these three stripes that if you see it,
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: you're like, gosh, that looks just like a sock garter. Yeah.
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  Speaker 1: They have the one I think one striped down the
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: back and then a couple on each side of the belly.
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: But there are a thirty five species. So there you know,
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: they're different kinds. There can be spots on some, and
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: the colors can range from kind of olive to brown
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: to black to gray. Uh. The fact of the show
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: for me, I don't know how I got to fifty
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: years old and never knew that Alaska didn't have snakes? Right?
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: Did you know that I did not? For some reason,
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: it's realing like the most minute bell in my head
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: that we've covered it before somewhere. I just that was
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: shocked by that because I just figured, like any huge
• 6:32
  Speaker 1: natural woodland paradise, there would be snakes everywhere. But there
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: are no snakes in Alaska. Yeah. I think it's just
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: generally too cold up there. But in two thousand five,
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: somebody found a garter snake that had been killed on
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: the road, and um, the Journal of Herpetology published a
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: study by researchers who who studied this thing tried to
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: figure out where it came from. So they studied its
• 6:56
  Speaker 1: d n A and they said that it's either a
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: from a relict or remnant population, or it was a
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: recent natural colonization or a fresh introduction. And if you
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: take all these explanations together, you see that they say
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: we have no idea how this snake. Here's what we're saying. Yeah,
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: it's funny. I was like, is there literally one other
• 7:18
  Speaker 1: possibility of how that snake got there unless you talk
• 7:20
  Speaker 1: about like you know, it fell from outer space right
• 7:23
  Speaker 1: dropped by the hand of God himself or herself exactly
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: or their selves. Yes, that's right. So these snakes are
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: very active. Uh, they're active during the day, they're active
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: during the night. If you are a gardener at your house,
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: that's where you're probably gonna find him. If you're doing
• 7:41
  Speaker 1: some weeding or something, all of a sudden, one will
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: just go yeah, and they'll you'll see him slithering away
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: as fast as possible. Exact, but they do. They are
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: good for your garden. You know. They'll eat pests, the
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: late little rodents, ell eat insects, slugs, sure, get rid
• 7:57
  Speaker 1: of the slugs. Snails, yeah, grasshoppers, like all these things
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: are things that like eat your garden, and the garden
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: snake sorry guard snake um eats these things for you.
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: So they it's like a natural pest clear that again
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: doesn't want to hurt your dog. It doesn't want to
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: hurt your dog or your kid or whatever. And in fact,
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: it can be a really fun way to introduce your
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: kid to snakes, uh, and let them hold a guard
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: snake because they're, um, they're you know, they're kind of
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: fun to hold. In it, you can get rid of
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: some of that fear of snakes that we tried so
• 8:31
  Speaker 1: hard to dispel in our Snakes episode. Right, It's a
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: good starter to teach your kid how to create their
• 8:38
  Speaker 1: own like freaky thing. It's like their thing that they're
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: known for throughout high school. It's a starter snake. I
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: love it. Sure, you can't have them as pets, but
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: they say if you find one in your garden, don't
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: just just let it go. Don't take that thing inside.
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: It's a wild animal. It may even be against the
• 8:57
  Speaker 1: law depending on where you live. But also, they actually
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: do breed garter snakes as pets, and I would guess
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: it's probably better for the garter snake to be born
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: in captivity and kept in captivity, then raised in the
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: wild and brought into a thirty gallon aquarium, you know, right. Um.
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: The other thing about garter snakes that you'll notice too is, again,
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: they're venomous, but they're harmless to humans. And one of
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: the reasons people thought they were non venomous for so long.
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: Is because their head is about the same size as
• 9:30
  Speaker 1: like the rest of their body, and that's usually a
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: big differentiator. Um. Just as a rule of thumb, a
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: thumb that you want to keep away from whatever snake
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: you're sizing up to that moment, that if the head
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: is about the same size as the body, is probably
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: not venomous. Yeah. Here in the United States for sure. Um.
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: And there are no you know, I've seen a lot
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: of erroneous uh hardened fast rules that aren't really always
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: hardened fast. But definitely, if you see a snake that
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: has a big sort of you know, diamond shaped head,
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: give it some space. It would just be my advice.
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: It might be fine, but give it space anyway, especially
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: if it's making a rattling sound with its tail. Yeah,
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: that's a dead giveaway. Um. There's one other thing about
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: garter snakes too that you should know that if you
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: are going to get curious and pick it up, which
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: is mean again, they're very shy. They don't want to
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: have anything to do with you, and they certainly don't
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: want to be picked up. Um. It may not only
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: bite you on the finger, like the one bit, chuck,
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: but it also could emit a foul smell. They're very
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: well known. Snakes generally do this, but garter snakes are
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: well known for basically spring poop, pea and musk combo out.
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: And that makes you want to drop it because you're
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: just like, yeah, and you should play that up too,
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: because they like hitting up props for that too, like,
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: oh my god, the smell. I can't take it. That's
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: very nice, Chuck, I love it. Are you got anything else?
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: I have nothing else, sir, well, And that's it for
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: short stuff, everybody. Hope you enjoyed. Be kind to garter snakes.
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: I think that the big takeaway from this one, which
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: means short stuff is out. Stuff you should know is
• 11:08
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