So for a few weeks now there's been a snake roaming around my dad's store. A couple of employees and customers have seen it but have not been able to take a picture of it and identify it.
Here's a picture of its skin that it shed yesterday. Can someone identify it based on its shed skin? Is it venomous?
Also this is in College Station, Texas
>>764822
Looks like a Black Snake, aka Black Racer. aka Black Rat Snake.
I would bet money on it. NC bro here, we see them all the time. I bet it's killing any rodents you may have, so keep it around if you don't have any animals close to the size of a rat walking about.
He do have some snake people on here, post it in the herp thread on an ( i see you made your on thread there) if no one else reply's.
>>>>>/an/2121461
Rat snake m8
Had one for years
>>764851
Probably this, the pattern on the back is fairly visible. Maybe a corn snake.
Not venomous, not dangerous. Eats rodents. Total snake-bro.
>>764827
Black racers aren't the same as a black rat snake. Both species are harmless to people though.
>>764822
i'm a snake guy and i can confirm it's a black mamba
>>765321
Racer is larger right?
>>765400
I'm no herpetologist or anything but looking at wikipedia it seems that rat snakes can grow larger. Southern Black Racers are fairly thin bodied and the largest one on record was 72" long while Eastern and Western Rat Snakes have been recorded at 101" in length.
I don't know enough to really tell them apart in the wild though except that racers will slither away from you really FAST while rat snakes generally move a lot slower and try to slither into a nearby hiding spot.
can you guys ID this? I live in GA so I'm always fearful that every snake is a copperhead. I think they're usually gray and black when they're going though right? Also more diamond shaped spots.
>>765409
That is an adolescent copper head
>>765409
Looks like a Midland Water Snake to me. Can't tell for sure that it's not a Copperhead with the head crushed though but the markings don't look quite right for a Copperhead to me.
>>765412
God dammit. Do I need to worry about this with my horses? They're in a pasture not stabled or anything.
>>765417
Copperheads spend most of their times in rocks
>>765417
We have shitloads of copperheads and water moccasins here in TX, I've seen 3 copperheads crossing roads in the past 2 weeks. You hardly EVER hear about a horse getting bit by one and the animals are large enough that the bite isn't really life threatening to them. It's more of a concern with small dogs dying from the bite.
>>765419
No rocks here in East TX, copperheads live in the woods and tall grasses in fields.
>>765419
Yeah, they're usually just in grasses here. Copperheads are terrible in the piedmont region of Georgia. They thrive in the hilly grassy areas and invade neighborhood suburbs all of the time here.
>>765416
This is what my grandfather said and he knows his shit, but he did only see this picture as well. I don't really get why there would be a water snake here though.
Herpetologist here, that's a Brazos Valley Trouser Snake
>>765424
>>765409
There are several different varieties of copperhead but their bands aren't normally broken up like the one in your photo. This time of year water snakes are roaming looking for new ponds, lakes, creeks, etc to breed. You'll also sometimes find snapping turtles and other water turtles on land far away from water sources for the same reason right now.
>>765428
Okay that makes the most sense. There's a large lake about a mile down the road and a pond right across the street. I'm sure there are some copperheads on the property but that just didn't look like one.
>>765431
Yeah they're probably there, they just blend in so well that you don't even see them most of the time. One time I was walking in the woods down by a creek as a kid, carrying a .22 and looking for turtles to shoot, and when I stopped walking I felt something thumping on my boot. I looked down and I was standing right on top of a small-ish copperhead. It amazed me that I never would have known it was there had I not been standing on it.
>>765437
Not that anon, but that's pretty common. Copperheads usually just chill and do their thing, and don't actively seek prey or move around often. They'll park somewhere and wait for something to eat to walk past, then use their god-tier camouflage to do the rest. The other day I was working on an irrigation line with my boss, and he grabbed a copperhead thinking it was part of the main hose just covered in mud. It struck at his wrist then hauled ass away.
Water moccasins/cottonmouths are the most aggressive. I got chased out of my favorite crappie fishing spot by a huge cottonmouth when I was about 10.
