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In red-sided garter snakes, the breeding season usually begins in early spring and lasts for about a month. [9] These snakes exhibit a polygynous mating system, which means that males mate with multiple females each season. [14] During the mating season, male snakes form a mating ball near the dens and court females as they emerge. [4]
The first garter snake to be scientifically described was the eastern garter snake (now Thamnophis sirtalis sirtalis), by zoologist and taxonomist Carl Linnaeus in 1758. The genus Thamnophis was described by Leopold Fitzinger in 1843 as the genus for the garter snakes and ribbon snakes. [2]
The scientific name Thamnophis sirtalis sirtalis is a combination of Ancient Greek and New Latin that means "bush snake that looks like a garter strap". The generic name Thamnophis is derived from the Greek "thamnos" (bush) and "ophis" (snake) and the specific name sirtalis is derived from the New Latin "siratalis" (like a garter), a reference to the snake's color pattern resembling a striped ...
Every year around this time, thousands of red-garter snakes wake up from months in hibernation dens in the Manitoba town of Narcisse. And there's only one thing on their minds. Mating.
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Generally, populations include far more males than females, so during mating season, they form "mating balls", in which one or two females are completely swamped by ten or more males. Sometimes a male snake mates with a female before hibernation, and the female stores the sperm internally until spring, when she allows her eggs to be fertilized.
Both mating balls were found when conservancy staff put implants in male “scout snakes,” set them free, and followed the signals to remote areas where people seldom tread.
High-energy cost of courting is also apparent in the red-sided garter snake, where the most vigorous males would succeed in copulation. [1] The intensity and amount of energy that male snakes put forth into the courting of females provides evidence for a polyandrous mating system among snake species.