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Posted
22 hours ago, Herbie Hancock said:

e309a42d233ba35aa7bbb73e0d8e13bb.jpg

Dad went out to change the belts on the baler and found this dude. Almost 4’ long. Had 7 buttons on his rattler

Dead snek.

Posted
13 minutes ago, BearSchlong said:

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Found a cool snake ID app. It saved his life. My dachshund found him in the garden.

The vertical stripes along the jaw are the dead giveaway and usually observable from a safe distance.

Good example of one doing its pit viper imitation with the flattened head.

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Posted
36 minutes ago, TwiceHorn said:

The vertical stripes along the jaw are the dead giveaway and usually observable from a safe distance.

Good example of one doing its pit viper imitation with the flattened head.

And the round pupil, not always observable from a safe distance. 

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Posted
And the round pupil, not always observable from a safe distance. 

Some guys on YouTube also said cottonmouth scales protrude over the eyes and cover them when observed from above.
Posted
29 minutes ago, BearSchlong said:

Some guys on YouTube also said cottonmouth scales protrude over the eyes and cover them when observed from above.

Also, you can pet it, and if it bites you, it’s probably a cottonmouth.

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Posted

Be really careful using short cuts when identifying snakes as venomous or harmless.  You'll hear that round pupils and bars on the jaws denote harmless water snakes as opposed to venomous cottonmouths.  Following those characteristics, this photo is easily identified:

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Except that its a venomous Florida cottonmouth (same traits are true for the Northern cottonmouth found in Texas).  While the harmless water snakes will not have vertical slits for pupils, light conditions effect the shape of pupils - in low light cottonmouths can have round pupils.  The bars on the jaw are not like the local water snakes which are on both the upper and lower jaws, however, when people give shortcuts, they often just say bars on the jaw.

This picture does show the hooded eyes which are mentioned upthread.  From the top, the eyes are not visible.  Water snakes do not have hooded eyes and their eyes are more on top as shown in @BearSchlong's picture above.

The best rule is that if a short cut is not 100% in every situation, its not a good short cut.

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Posted
17 hours ago, South Austin said:

Also, you can pet it, and if it bites you, it’s probably a cottonmouth.

Although humorous, water snakes are actually some of the most aggressive non-poisonous snakes. They can have a nasty bite and a mouth full of bacteria. I had a HS classmate get bitten by a DB water snake and he got really sick from it. Although he was a low IQ idiot who deserved it thinking he would impress the girls playing around with it. I don't think they were too impressed.

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Posted (edited)

369AAE61-5CFD-4E8B-B4B8-7B295D22D3E6.thumb.jpeg.bf44e71ea78fb1830de0d23add964769.jpegMy daughter sent me this picture of a Gulf Marsh Snake. Her professor and a staff biologist had never seen one before. I’m not sure where in south texas they are but they were down there to observe baby gators. 
Edit to add that this was collected as part of a snake survey that Texas State is helping TWPD with. 

Edited by Shoxthemonkey
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Posted
On 4/6/2025 at 6:23 AM, Hard Times said:

Although humorous, water snakes are actually some of the most aggressive non-poisonous snakes. They can have a nasty bite and a mouth full of bacteria. I had a HS classmate get bitten by a DB water snake and he got really sick from it. Although he was a low IQ idiot who deserved it thinking he would impress the girls playing around with it. I don't think they were too impressed.

Yeah, they're aggro and bitey.

Posted
11 hours ago, gsoda3 said:

Eastern copperhead. If you want to free it a bit of oil on the sticky trap will do it. 

Yep, what I told her and she kind of freaked.  Has two small dogs, etc.  Backs up to a creek/greenbelt so the little dude was just out doing snek shit.  She ended it with a shovel.  

Never had much fear of snakes.  We used to have rattlesnake roundups at our place back in the day so I helped handle/manage hundreds of them.  Also didn't like seeing them all killed so I leave them alone - except water moccasins.  Fuck them....

Posted
Some solid snakes along Brushy Creek the last few months.
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Rough earthsnake, Western ratsnake, and rough greensnake.  Great pictures. 

I was in Brushy Creek this morning and only saw one plain-bellied watersnake. 

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Posted

I was walking along the Bosque with the wife and we came upon a lady and her kid who were watching a snake along the shore. Apparently, my tone was "assholeish" according to my wife when I corrected the lady that it was a water snake and not a cottonmouth. It wasn't my fault that I was trying to prevent her from corrupting the youth. 

I blame this thread.

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Posted
1 hour ago, SimonBolivar said:

I was walking along the Bosque with the wife and we came upon a lady and her kid who were watching a snake along the shore. Apparently, my tone was "assholeish" according to my wife when I corrected the lady that it was a water snake and not a cottonmouth. It wasn't my fault that I was trying to prevent her from corrupting the youth. 

I blame this thread.

I was playing golf and my playing partner (who I didn’t know well) and I saw two snakes in the water hazard. He immediately began bragging about almost being bitten by a rattlesnake. The fairway became very quiet and uncomfortable when I said they were diamondback water snakes and not rattlesnakes. I may be unwelcome in the future. 

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Posted
4 minutes ago, Dbeasy said:

I was playing golf and my playing partner (who I didn’t know well) and I saw two snakes in the water hazard. He immediately began bragging about almost being bitten by a rattlesnake. The fairway became very quiet and uncomfortable when I said they were diamondback water snakes and not rattlesnakes. I may be unwelcome in the future. 

I heard the story this morning excep the snakes are now anacodarattlemoccasins. 

Posted
31 minutes ago, crash_davis said:

I heard the story this morning excep the snakes are now anacodarattlemoccasins. 

anacondarattlemoccasinmurderhornets

FIFY

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Posted
3 hours ago, Jerry Callo said:

I love coral snakes.  They are pretty well camouflaged when sitting still and then look like flashing marquee lights when they're moving.

It’s impressive every time you see one.

Posted

I think a coral would be my least amount of fear while seeing a Texas venomous snek. I grew up walking past copperheads in east TX so I'm used to them. They're pretty damn docile but fuck you can never see them. Cottonmouths can suck my dick. Every time I see a bullshit fb video about how they aren't aggressive I just wanna pull those fuckers back to my childhood and teenage years. Yes maybe they were just being curious but they still would've bitten me and they like to get danger close. 

And in the 43 years I've lived in Texas, including spending countless summers on our ranch in Jack County, I have never seen a rattler in the wild. I've heard them a hundred times, but never seen one. Hell we have plenty of posts every year on our neighborhood fb page about them showing up in garages and shit. Still never seen one. 

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