Where Are The Snakes?

[creek wader]

I've always thought and then did some research on the web, that viper's have an arrowhead shaped head. All the pics that I saw on the web, of cottonmouths and copperheads, did have an arrowhead shaped head. Their heads are larger than their necks. Kind of a flange look. The nonvenomous snakes heads were roughly the same size as their necks. Unfortunately, you have to be close enough to see this. Although, I've done a little research on the banded water snake, when threatened they'll inflate their heads, to appear like a copper head. That may lead to some misidentification. see .. http://www.uga.edu/srelherp/snakes/nerfas.htm ..Also, the pith vipers have two extra pits (holes) on their heads. I hope I never get close enough to see this. Something that suprised me, was the young cottonmouths were roughly the same color as the banded water snakes and copperheads. More of a brownish color with similar markings. Also, I too have heard that the cottonmouths and copperheads swim on top of the water and the nonvenomous snakes hang lower in the water with just the heads out. I couldn't find any confirmation of this on the net. Could be a bouyancy issue there, not sure. Anybody have any thoughts on that? .... I give all the snakes a wide berth.

[Chief Grey Bear]

Sounds like the snakes from SW MO moved to the East. LOL!! I was just doing a little figuring in my head, and in the last two years alone I have floated or waded somewhere in the neighborhood of 40 or 50 different miles of streams in my corner of the state in the following counties; Jasper, Newton, McDonald, Barry, Lawrence, and Dade. And that doesn't count the strip pits and MDC lakes and ponds I hit in Barton, Vernon and Bates counties.

Some of those miles on numerous occasions and unless I am just extremely unlucky in spotting them, I just ain't seeing as snakes as I did 15 or 20 yrs ago.

And as for seeing a copperhead in the water. I think I may have seen one. One night while frogging on Spring River in the late 80's, I was shining my Coleman lantern up under some willow weed. I saw what appeared to be by my quick calculation to be a copperhead looking at me. Sorry I didn't stick around long enough to verify the markings and pit between the nostril and the eye. As soon I focused in on the lite skin pigment and dark arrow shape bands, I was like a duck on water. It positively what not any banded water snake I had every seen.

[jdmidwest]

Getting close enough to any snake in order to make a positive id is usually ok. I usually make it a habit to get snakes off of limbs with the tip of my fly rod while wading creeks. Sometimes they will stay put even with me touching them with the rod tip. Cottonmouths are usually more agressive and will come after you during breeding season. Cottonmouths are barred similar to water snakes when young but tend to turn a solid dark color as they age. Cats eye pupils and a dark pinstrip on the head separating the dark top of the head from the light under side is another tell tale sign. I have noticed they are usually thicker bodied which make the tail look stubby. They have a triangle head but it is sometimes masked by the thicker body.

Copperheads have hourglass patterns made up of solid colors, one of which is usually a distinct copper color. Water snakes have stripes and patterns but not the distinct hourglass and the pattern usually continues on the belly side of the snake. Cats eye pupils and the triangle head are good too.

I have encountered all three on streams and lakes. All of our poison snakes are good swimmers. As I noted in the earlier post, they always seem to ride higher in the water. Most watersnakes crossing a stream will leave a v trail in the water from the head. Poison snakes seem to crawl on top of the water and most of the snakes body is exposed.

[Al Agnew]

Yep, the swimming position high in the water is very distinctive, and a very good sign that it's a cottonmouth or copperhead. I've actually only seen one copperhead swimming, but it did swim with body floating on top the water. Cottonmouths don't ALWAYS swim this way...being semi-aquatic snakes, they can swim underwater. But when you see one swimming with its whole body seemingly on top the water and head raised at an angle, it's pretty obvious.

The hourglass markings on copperheads are also very distinctive. Some of the copperheads I've seen were a little duller in color than others, but they all have big dark hourglass bands. If you keep in mind that the DARK bands on copperheads are thinnest in the middle of the back and thicken considerably as they go down the sides, you will know a copperhead when you see one. However, once you actually see one, I don't see how anybody can ever mistake any other banded snake for it. They are very distinctive.

Harmless northern watersnakes sometimes appear to have a somewhat triangular head, so that's not a real good ID feature. It won't be as triangular as the pit vipers, but enough to confuse some observers.

[Project Healing Waters]

Good ID pointers so far, but there's one good one that has been missed so far: Cottonmouths and Copperheads are comparatively SHORT snakes. If you are looking at a snake over 4' long and wondering if it is a Cottonmouth or a Copperhead or some harmless snake, there's better than a 99.5% chance it is NOT either of these two vipers. The only poisonous snake that has a native range in MO that gets more than 4' long is the Rattlesnake.

Cottonmouths tend to be noticeably FAT/thick. And they generally appear to be a charcoal gray to black. They can appear "aggressive" at times, but 90% of the time or more will flee at the first sign of a human being.

Juvenile Northern Water Snakes and Copperheads are the ones that are hardest to distinguish. The Copperhead develops the distinct markings over the first year of its life. The young ones often do not have an obvious copper tinted head. And the body camo pattern evolves as well (on both the NWS and the Copperhead). And at less than 1 year old, they will both be less than 4' long. By next year, however, the NWS will be well over 3', and the Copperhead will still probably be under 3'. The Copperhead will have the distinct copper head and hourglass pattern on the body that is sharper in contrast than the more "camo-like" pattern on the NWS. And, yes, a NWS does appear to have a triangular head. That gets a LOT of them killed.

Finally, over 90% of all snake bite "victims" seen by doctors in the US each year (USDHHS) are males under the age of 25 who have been bitten on the hands/arms. The moral of that story is simple: leave snakes alone and they will leave you alone.

I try to give ALL snakes as wide a berth as possible and not worry about identifying them...even though I am pretty good at ID'ing them.

[Wayne SW/MO]

I think the absence of snakes has a lot to do with the increase in human activity, they don't like us either.

I haven't seen a lot of Cottonmouths, and I can only think of one area where I've seen them in the water. They're certainly not aggressive and I wonder why someone on here, some time back, said he went armed to Crane Creek?

There's a King snake that is very close in appearance to Copperheads. When we lived on an acreage in Laclede county we had a good population of these, and I always had to look twice.

[Crippled Caddis]

Having been raised in NE Texas I have NO problem distinguishing Cottonmouth from common water snakes. After 17 years in the Ozarks I've seen 2 actual Cottonmouth. But the common brown watersnake that is ubiquitous to the point of being ridiculous on the Spring River of North Arkansas still can put me on the bank when he insists on swimming between my legs!

As some have already pointed out the true Cottonmouth is a short, very thick, fore-shortened snake that is predominantly a dirty black in color. While he is normally somewhat reclusive he can and often does react aggressively to his perception of incursion on his personal comfort zone. So long as you see him first and give him a wide detour there is no problem, but he WILL readily defend his territory. Remain aware of where you and your feet are and you should encounter no problems. CC

[jdmidwest]

CC, Spring River has its share of the cottony mouth variety also. A few years back there was one holed up on a brush pile in the Bayou hole above the waterfall. I saw her(?)several times that summer, assumed her to be nesting. Lowland variety trout stream, cypress trees and trout fishing, different than most trout waters.

An old watersnake that is about ready to shed looks alot like a cottonmouth..

Thick body, dull, dark, hard to notice patterns on back.

[Tightline]

Here are some pics.The Western Cottonmouth is the one thats almost black,(a MDC photo).The lighter colored with the distinct bands is the Northern Water Snake,I took its picture this summer down on Bull Creek.

I think Jd is right,older water snakes and younger cottonmouths look alot more like each other.

[Phil Lilley]

I used to hunt for snakes in SE Kansas growing up... saw alot of timber rattlers and copperheads along with a bunch other kinds of snakes. Pretty fun as long as you saw the snake before or just as he saw you. The other way around isn't fun at all, no matter how much you may love them.