Reptile & Amphibian Forums

This photo was taken by Sean McCann in Vero Beach, Florida. Vero Beach is on the Atlantic Ocean a little south of the midpoint of the peninsula.

He email'ed it to me and asked my opinion.

I think it is a Yellow Rat Snake which is gray in color. It clearly has the four dark stripes which characterize Yellow Rat Snakes. Sean estimated that it was 200 cm (or 78 inches) in length. There are few other species which reach that length. And it is holding its neck in the S-curve which is typical of rat snakes.

Vero Beach is far south of the range of the Gray Rat Snake.

The snake was not captured.

I'm posting the photo (with Sean's permission) in the Field Forum and in the Rat Snake Forum.

Any thoughts ? Is this morph common ?

My email is tspinker@hotmail.com and Sean's is smccann27@gmail.com

I don't think that is a Yellow Rat Snake at all. It looks like a very dark colored Gulf Hammock Snake. What I think is that it is someone's science project that escaped into the wild, and not a natural intergrade from that area.

Thanks for posting the photo.

I agree that it is definitley not a yellow rat and is probably someone's pet that escaped or was let loose. Looks to be a light-colored black rat to me. Typically, yellows are found much farther inland than Vero, which is right out on the coastline. Those coastal habitats are much more typical of corn snake country. Also, a yellow that size would be showing none of the dorsal pattern that this particular animal is showing. Thanks for showing the picture though, it is definitely a mystery snake!

>>I don't think that is a Yellow Rat Snake at all. It looks like a very dark colored Gulf Hammock Snake. What I think is that it is someone's science project that escaped into the wild, and not a natural intergrade from that area.
>>
>>Thanks for posting the photo.

Thanks for your replies.

It's very possible that the snake was transported there from somewhere else.

In various locales in FL the anerythristic morph of the yellow rat has been found.There is one pic in that pet store "ratsnakes"book and Mark Lucas had one for sale a few years back.That one was bred to a wc albino yellow and there are a couple of us around with multi-het offspring.Dwight G and Steve ....(forgot your last name,from AZ) have had lines of these going along with a few others.As far as I know there hasnt been a f2 anery yellow produced....would like to see one!Jeff