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Thamnophis sp.
A garter snake species. Not sure of the exact species. The red coloration is not common from what I've seen of these snakes.
Found of the forest floor near a fallen log which it retreated to after a few minutes
Would not have seen this beautiful snake had it not attacked my shoe.
Thanks for the kind comments everyone! Also, thanks for helping narrow it down to Thamnophis sirtalis. I'm thinking that is could be T. s. parietalis, which is a subspecies with red markings. Anyone agree?
I love Eastern Garter Snakes. I love the red in this one. Awesome shots!
Yes Lucky, the widespread common garter snake has many subspecies that "can" have (quite a bit of) red coloration (e.g. Thamnophis sirtalis sirtalis), and other species as well can have red, including Thamnophis radix http://www.herpnet.net/Iowa-Herpetology/...
Done Scott. Any idea on why it has red in it's design? Is that common for garters?
Yes a garter snake. In the meantime, you could add that in to the common name rather than "unknown spotting" since it really isn't "unkonwn". There are 3 species in Iowa http://www.gartersnake.info/species/us/i... All three are of the genus Thamnophis. In the meantime could be written "Thamnophis sp." in the scientific name. :-)