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WORCESTER TELEGRAM (Massachusetts) 10 September 06 Big black snakes share our habitat - Racers are as good as their name (Charlene Perkins Cutler)
In a discussion concerning the limits pushed by food vendors, my Dad once related a story of how one area restaurant had eel on the menu. This was back in the ’30s.
Evidently, someone caught the cook preparing the dish and discovered that the animal destined for the table of hungry diners was not eel but “overland black snake.” That’s what my Dad called the Northern Black Racer.
Perhaps this story repulses me because I can’t imagine consuming eel.
Or maybe I have shivers up and down my back because of the “overland black snake.” Despite their important part in our ecosystem, I just don’t like snakes at all.
The Northern Black Racer, Coluber c. constrictor, is a big snake. It averages 4.5 feet in length, but ranges from 34 to 77 inches.
That’s a big snake.
I remember the day when I was visiting an art show and one surreptitiously glided over my sandaled feet. I barely survived the experience.
The racer is found in all 48 of the contiguous United States and in a wide variety of habitats. It is diurnal, that is, not nocturnal.
The Northern Black Racer prefers open or lightly wooded areas like fields, rocky slopes, and powerline cuts. They thrive where areas are periodically cleared.
In the summer they will spend their nights under discarded wood or metal. In the winter, they hibernate in dens in rocky areas.
April and May are dangerous months to approach the racer. They breed in the spring and can be most defensive, to the point of holding their ground and approaching the object that has threatened them. Females lay five to 28 eggs in the summer months and the young hatch in 6 to 9 weeks.
Even at birth, the newly hatched snakes are nearly a foot long. They are big snakes.
It is named the Northern Black Racer for a reason: it moves very quickly. As it makes its way through grass and brush, the head is held above the ground to see.
The body is dark grayish-black in color; its belly is white, yellow or dark gray. The head is rather small for the size of the snake. The chin is white and the mouth features a darker blue-black upper lip.
For someone as snake-phobic as I am, the matter gets worse. The Northern Black Racer hangs out in large groups — even with other species of snakes!
I suppose if it has any redeeming qualities, it is because the racer consumes other snakes, as well as large insects, frogs, toads, lizards, small rodents and birds. Although its name implies that it constricts its prey, that is not true. It merely pins the “food” in its coils and swallows it alive. What eats is also eaten, and the Northern Black Racer itself is prey for a number of larger vertebrates.
Did I mention this thing is big? It’s a really big snake!
Racers are as good as their name

....thats the funnyiest thing ive heard in along time!...