Broad-Banded Watersnake

Description:

A beautiful semiaquatic snake named for its broad, irregular shaped bands or blotches. The bands may be brown, red-brown, or black and are separated by yellow or yellowish gray. There is often a faint dark line running diagonally from the eye past the corner of the mouth. The belly is yellow and boldly marked with black. The young are more brightly colored than the adults.

Habitat:

Normally most active at night, is it sometimes seen basking in sunlight on logs or among branches above the water in cypress swamps, river sloughs, or oxbow lakes

Notes:

Like other watersnakes, broad-banded watersnakes are often mistaken for western cottonmouths and needlessly killed.