Gators Rule":29pwqse3 said:
you are indeed correct...not a herpetologist. Seen plenty of yellow rat snakes, but nothing near 84". While the indigo is considered threatened, we do see quite a few of them around here, as well as black racers (aggressive little rascals).
Quick story about indigos: When I did alligator shows at Cypress Gardens back in the day, we had local law enforcement bring us a large 7' blue indigo male to keep as evidence in a murder investigation. It seems he was found in the tub of a Holiday Inn room where a guy had been shot to death. About that time, we were hosting a Boy Scout jamboree, and our director was giving a demonstration on how to exit a tent if a rattlesnake were to enter while the camper was sleeping. I know...crazy. After his presentation, he brought out the indigo and spoke about how docile indigo snake are....or were.....because as soon as he mentioned the snake's calm demeanor, it reared back like a cobra, and tore his butt up....LoL I've handled rattlesnakes, cobras and pythons of varying lengths, but every time I see an indigo in the wild, I drift back to that memory and let them go their merry way.
Addressed to Gators Rule, et al.
Your response is appreciated. I understand your confession that you have not seen a Yellow Rat Snake 84 inches long. That is a record length for the subspecies. However, Audubon documents the length of the Rat Snake (
Elaphe obsoleta) as 34 to 101 inches. The largest variety of the Rat Snake is the Black Rat Snake (
Elaphe obsoleta obsoleta) so the one in the picture is about 3 feet short of what the largest ones in a population will attain. I personally have measured specimens of the Black Rat snake at over 7 feet. My Master of Science Degree is in Biology with an emphasis on Zoology. My Master’s thesis is entitled, “A Herpetofaunal Survey of Upper Lick Fork, Rowan County, KY”. I collected several large Black Rat snakes as part of my requirements for the thesis. It is interesting to note that the remote mountains of Appalachia harbor some very large specimens due to the fact they are not killed off by human activity before they reach maturity. I collected a large Northern Copperhead,
Agkistrodon contortrix mokeson that was 52 inches long. It is hopefully still in the Morehead State University collection. That was the largest Copperhead in the university collection and the largest the Chairman of my Committee had ever seen in 30 years of teaching Herpetology.
Laymen often misunderstand the identification of herptiles. No snake in North America can be correctly identified as a “black snake”. There are Black Rat Snakes, Black Racers, Black Kingsnakes, etc. In Australia there is a snake identified as simply a “Black Snake”. They are members of the Elapidae or cobra family and their bite is lethal as they harbor a highly toxic neurotoxic venom.
The specimen in the picture above is a “large” Black Rat Snake. I am not surprised at your reaction. I was particularly impressed with the specimen’s girth. It is hard to identify snakes in pictures. As demonstrated by the picture, I was able to view the specimen “in hand”. It had the white under-throat and mottled pattern that is characteristic of the species. Plus, with experience, the form of the head and contour of the body can be used to identify species much as one can tell a bull calf from a heifer calf even in profile at dusk.
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The meanest snake I have encountered is the common Northern Water Snake. When I was in college it was Natrix sipedon. Currently it is reclassified as Nerodia sipedon. They are the most common water snake from Ky north in the eastern United States. They bite savagely. I was not fond of collecting specimens in the small streams of Ky where they are extremely abundant in some areas. Story: I lifted the edge of a very large flat rock near a pond. Under it was at least 30 or 40 water snakes. Most were juveniles but there were about 5 adults that were as big around as my wrist and maybe 30 inches long. The sudden exposure to them caused me to drop the rock, jump back, and let out a yell of fright.
