Further Study of the Garter Snake, Thamnophis sirtalis, in Northeastern Kansas
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Issue Date
2001-06-15Author
Fitch, Henry S.
Publisher
Natural History Museum, University of Kansas
Type
Article
Article Version
Scholarly/refereed, publisher version
Is part of series
Scientific Papers;19
Rights
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
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Show full item recordAbstract
The red-sided garter snake, Thamnophis sirtalis parietalis, is a prominent member of the
local snake fauna at the Fitch Natural History Reservation and has been a subject of field study over
the past 53 years. Although several publications in whole or in part, have been devoted to this species, some aspects of its ecology have remained poorly known; some of these are dealt with in the present
paper. Herein, I discuss the range of variation in color and pattern, and compare the frequencies of
pattern types in males and females; I also compare the sexes with each other and with immatures in
their ecological traits including vagility and their fidelity to specific locations. Comparison of feeding
records show major differences in food habits between the sexes and between young and adults. A
northern population of this same subspecies in the Interlake Region in Manitoba, Canada, is compared
behaviorally with the Kansas population on the basis of recent studies.
ISSN
1094-0782Collections
- Scientific Papers [46]
Citation
Fitch, H. S. (2001). Further study of the garter snake, Thamnophis sirtalis, in northeastern Kansas / by Henry S. Fitch. Scientific Papers, (19), 1-6. doi:10.5962/bhl.title.16287
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