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Was cleaning up this weekend and found this little guy under some old boards and i thought at first cotton mouth but he didn't seem angry like they usually are and also did not have have the bright white mouth when he struck once so i put him in the creek and let him go on his way.

I say I'd have needed a change of shorts after finding it.

Head looks like a pit viper of some sort... dark colored copperhead possibly ?

Looks like a water moccasin to me.

were the pupils round or slitted?

Kinda hard to tell from the picture, but it looks like the outer part of his mouth is yellow which would be a common water snake. I think the head shape looks triangular but may be that he has puffed his neck out slightly to give the appearance of a venomous snake. They will strike at you if cornered but they are not dangerous. JMHO based on the picture.

If it didn't try to kill you and just seemed mildly annoyed at you for disturbing its nap, it was a water snake. Looks dead on just like a cottonmouth, but without the white mouth, deadly venom, and bad attitude. When I was a kid, I was playing in the front yard and was supposed to be watching a younger sibling who was about 3 or 4. I saw said sibling over by some tall hedges reaching under them and messing with something. I went over to see what he was doing and found him petting a three foot snake such as you have pictured. Naturally I picked him up and teleported to the other side of the yard. When my dad came out and poked the snake with a rake handle it just looked at him and slithered off. We lived right on a pond and had both water snakes and cottonmouths. Just looking at them, they are pretty much identical.

Watersnake does seem plausible after seeing this picture. Never seen a snake flatten it's head out to make itself look poisonous like that before. I've seen some darkly colored Copperheads before - I've heard they look that way right before or right after shedding their skin(can't remember which it was).

Pariah3j wrote:

Watersnake does seem plausible after seeing this picture. Never seen a snake flatten it's head out to make itself look poisonous like that before. I've seen some darkly colored Copperheads before - I've heard they look that way right before or right after shedding their skin(can't remember which it was).

probably a blotched water snake. But considering my kids, if it showed up in my yard I'd have probably exterminated the thing just in case. If not for the kids I'd have probably attempted to scoop it up with a shovel and send it on its way.

What ya'll say on this snake ?

Dad said :
"Tastes like chicken"

Don't think you could get a complete boot out of that one.

Pariah3j wrote:

Watersnake does seem plausible after seeing this picture. Never seen a snake flatten it's head out to make itself look poisonous like that before. I've seen some darkly colored Copperheads before - I've heard they look that way right before or right after shedding their skin(can't remember which it was).

Yeah, lots of water snakes get killed because they are mistaken for moccasins, due to the whitish yellow around their mouth, and that is probably a defensive adaptation on the species to scare away potential predators. It doesn't help their cause with people because they inhabit the same places as moccasins. They get to be a lot bigger than copperheads or moccasins, I caught one a few years ago that was over 5 feet long. I took him to Mrs. Jusme to show her how pretty he was, but she has a whole different view of attractiveness in nature.

JustSomeOldGuy wrote:were the pupils round or slitted?

I blew up the pic. They are round.

Well i killed two copperheads weekend before last and there was a big old grass snake that i didn't know under the sheets of old underpinning and it went threw and it him so i had to kill him and that made me mad at myself so i don't like killing something that is good to have a round . After looking around some at different pics i really think it is a water snake so i am not concerned about it being venomous. Thanks for all the input .