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This was posted on a fishing forum as being found under a lawn mower in NW Florida. Any thoughts on what it is? I have asked for more info, but have not received it yet.
I was thinking Queen, Crayfish, or possibly Plain-bellied.
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Jenea
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I am probably totally off but my guess would be a cottonmouth going from the way the head looks in the pics. Do you have any more pics? Andy Paulison
Head/stripe as well as pattern on sides look like cotton to me.
Didn't make it I assume...
:Mark
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Surrender Dorothy!
Florida Cottonmouth Agkistrodon piscivorous conanti - the well defined head striping and obscured dorsal pattern are good identifiers, in addition to the head shape and keeled scales.
Tough day to be Cottonmouth...
JPD
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I am so not lesdysxic!
0.1 Creamsicle Cornsake "Yolanda"
1.0 Bairds Ratsnake "Steely Dan"
0.1 Desert Kingsnake "FATTY"
Agreed. It is a young Cottonmouth.
I'm looking at this and I agree it is Akistrodon. You can faintly see what is left of the body pattern that suggests Moc. However, it is very skinny (to my experience) for a cotton mouth. The proportions and light body color suggest to me possible hybrid to a copperhead.
What ever it was damned pity it's dead. What interesting genetics might have come from it.
Frank
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"The luxury of not getting involved departed with the last lifeboat Skipper..."
I didn't see anyone mention it was dead, only that it was found under a lawn mower.
Look at the picture a little more closely. If that snake wasn't dead when the picture was taken, I can't imagine it would have lived much longer.
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Diego
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>>However, it is very skinny (to my experience) for a cotton mouth. The proportions and light body color suggest to me possible hybrid to a copperhead...
>>Frank
Yeah, it is kind of skinny for a moc. Its kind of smallish, so maybe it hasn't had time to fatten up yet?
Looks pretty dead too. Thats a deep wound on the back, and the head is cocked at a bad angle. Besides, if it were alive, it would have been real PO'd, and hard to photograph safely.
Regards
John D
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I am so not lesdysxic!
0.1 Creamsicle Cornsake "Yolanda"
1.0 Bairds Ratsnake "Steely Dan"
0.1 Desert Kingsnake "FATTY"
It was dead, and the guy was to scared to look in his garbage can for a better description!! Big sissy!
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Jenea
2:3:1 Tricolor Hognose
2:2 Eastern Hognose
1:2 Western Hognose
1:2 Southern Hognose
0:0:3 Florida Redbelly Snakes
0:1 Gulf Coast Box Turtle
1:1 Red-eared Slider
2:0 Cats
1:1 Kids
1:0 Spouse
Its head and eyes don't look like a cottonmouth. I don't know what it is but it looks like some kind of water dwelling colubrid. And if it were a young Agkistrodon, hybrid or not, it would be way more patterned than that. I'm not from FL so I don't know what all obscure little snakes they have down there.
Ryan T,
>>Its head and eyes don't look like a cottonmouth.
The head looks very much like a moc - the overhead is the correct outline for a pitviper, and the side shot clearly shows two white stripes, one temporal, and one on the labial scales. These are pointed out as a diagnostic feature by Conant and Collins, pg. 104, Plate 34. I cant see anything that looks like a definite eye to me. The bright spot that shows up in the pic is in the wrong place to be the eye. It could be the pit, but I doubt it. Most likely it is an artifact.
>>I don't know what it is but it looks like some kind of water dwelling colubrid.
How about being a little more specific? Got a suggestion and interpretation of the photographic evidence to support it? Simple gainsaying is neither evidence, no argument.
>>And if it were a young Agkistrodon, hybrid or not, it would be way more patterned than that.
I don't know if its young, I don't know what size it is, I can't make out any pattern. In fact I really don't know if the color I'm seeing is the actual color of the snake, or if its covered with dried mud.
>>I'm not from FL so I don't know what all obscure little snakes they have down there.
Well I'm not from Florida either, and I can name more than a dozen off the top of my head. Want to ID snakes from crappy pics off the internet with almost no background info? Get a good field guide, like Conant and Collins Field Guide to Reptiles and Amphibians of East/Central North America, Houghton Mifflin 1998.
As Mr. Miyagi might have said to the Karate Kid, and Yoda to young Luke Skywalker:
Don't think - Know!
Cheers,
JPD
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I am so not lesdysxic!
0.1 Creamsicle Cornsake "Yolanda"
1.0 Bairds Ratsnake "Steely Dan"
0.1 Desert Kingsnake "FATTY"
0.1 Black Rat (WV Rescue) "Roberta"
That was absolutely a cottonmouth. The head markings on the side in the first pic are typical & one of the keys to the species.
Cottonmouths out of the water are often covered with dried algae that obscures the color & pattern.
~~Greg~~
Florida's Venomous Snakes
>>Its head and eyes don't look like a cottonmouth.
That's what I thought when I saw the first pic, but after closer inspection I'm pretty sure the nose is either smashed or pushed into what ever that brown substance is. I've never seen a cotton that skinny, but with a little enhancement I can see one section of pattern well enough. How close have you ever looked at a cotton's head? Compare this to the secong pic. Also, note how far forward the eyes are...
Awesome pic - how in the world did you get close enough to take that? It shows the Cottonmouth's large head scales beautifully! Those same scales are discernable on an enhancement of the overhead pic in the post.
I stand corrected on the eye position - it is indeed far forward, as befits a snake that makes its living by delivering a fast accurate strike. Watersnakes have eyes more on the sides, as befits their hunting strategy and frequent role as prey.
I haden't thought about the front of the head being pushed-in. It may in fact be that the eye of the snake in the pic was partially extruded as the result of the mower trauma, making it look especially prominent. I agree, that is the unfortunate creature's eye.
I stand by the diagnostic head markings visible in the side view. None of the Watersnakes, nor the Copperhead, show these markings.
It is far more likely that the snake is a thin (perhaps emaciated?) Cottonmouth than an aberrantly marked individual of another species.
Regards,
John D.
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I am so not lesdysxic!
0.1 Creamsicle Cornsake "Yolanda"
1.0 Bairds Ratsnake "Steely Dan"
0.1 Desert Kingsnake "FATTY"
0.1 Black Rat (WV Rescue) "Roberta"
>>Awesome pic - how in the world did you get close enough to take that?
It's cropped from an 8MP pic, taken from as close as I was comfortable getting, with a 10X zoom. It's actually scaled down to about 60% so that most of it will fit on most monitors...
>>I stand corrected on the eye position - it is indeed far forward, as befits a snake that makes its living by delivering a fast accurate strike. Watersnakes have eyes more on the sides, as befits their hunting strategy and frequent role as prey.
I think there's another reason, but I'm not ready to "publish" yet...
>>It may in fact be that the eye of the snake in the pic was partially extruded as the result of the mower trauma, making it look especially prominent.
Maybe, but I think it's something else. The surpaocular scale protrudes above the eye in cottons, and in at least some specimens, the upper while line of the facial marking goes all the way around the outside edge of that scale. That's what it looks like to me...or maybe just a glint of light off the edge of the scale (but this snake looks fairly non-shiny).
>>>>...The surpaocular scale protrudes above the eye in cottons, and in at least some specimens, the upper while line of the facial marking goes all the way around the outside edge of that scale...
Yeah, I see that after looking at CrimsonKing's pic in the next post.
>>>...(but this snake looks fairly non-shiny)...
I gotta agree, and CrimsonKing makes the same point - that is one dirty, messed up snake. I'seen this a lot with aquatic serpents - if they've been in muddy, scumy water, when they dryup, they are coated with that crud.
Talk about a bad hair day!
Regards,
John D.
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I am so not lesdysxic!
0.1 Creamsicle Cornsake "Yolanda"
1.0 Bairds Ratsnake "Steely Dan"
0.1 Desert Kingsnake "FATTY"
0.1 Black Rat (WV Rescue) "Roberta"
...wash that snake off and get the dried reddish clay of of it you would see much more pattern. It's there...look at the lower left of the pic.
Here's a younger cotton than that one for sure...AND much much more alive!
:Mark
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Surrender Dorothy!
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