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Project Noah Nature School
Nerodia sipedon sipedon
A ?juvenile? Black snake with yellowish-white horizontal stripes. Wandered into our office today.
Office is surrounded by woods.
Hi there. Since you know the identity of your organism, please go ahead and fill in the scientific name field. This allows the spotting to fully enter the database and become complete, letting groups and individuals use the data and find your spotting. It also takes the spotting off the "unidentified" list. Thank you!
Here's a great Project Noah blog entry that explains the spotting process:
http://blog.projectnoah.org/post/2870249...
There aren't many snakes up in your neck of the woods, so it's easy to determine what snake this is by process of elimination.
It appears to be a juvenile.
By the shape of the head, it would not appear to be a pit viper. There are only 4 poisonous snakes in the US. There are only 2 in Connecticut, and this is neither of those (not a rattler, not a copperhead). From the body shape and coloration, that leaves only the hog-nosed snake. There are many color morphs with this species.
In a nutshell, not poisonous.
When threatened, they will flatten their head out (cobra style) which is very freaky. They will hiss and even shake the end of their tail like a rattler (but they can only make noise with the tail if they're in a bunch of leaves).
If you try to pick this snake up, it is unlikely to bite, but will turn upside down and try to play dead. They give off a snake musk which is VERY pungent... so I don't recommend picking up the snake if you're wearing nice clothes or have to go to a meeting afterwards. The musk smells like the world's worst possible body odor... if you get it on your skin, you can use a nail brush and GoJo and it still won't come off for a few hours.
These are good snakes. They keep amphibian populations down by eating toads & frogs.
Spotted on May 24, 2012
Submitted on May 24, 2012
