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while field herping this past weekend i saw 6 cottonmouths, 1 was what i consider normal coloration, 4 were orange (one juvenile and three mid-sized snakes), 1 full grown (almost three feet) that was a dark rusty red color, i have a few pictures but dont know how to post them on this. Are these colors normal for cottonmouths? ive only ever seen black or tan ones in the wild before, this was in NC by the way

>>while field herping this past weekend i saw 6 cottonmouths, 1 was what i consider normal coloration, 4 were orange (one juvenile and three mid-sized snakes), 1 full grown (almost three feet) that was a dark rusty red color, i have a few pictures but dont know how to post them on this. Are these colors normal for cottonmouths? ive only ever seen black or tan ones in the wild before, this was in NC by the way

I would love to see the photos

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Cindy Steinle
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well i have tried for the past hour to upload the photos without any luck, feel free to look at them on my facebook(Curtis Parker) i actually have one of the pictures as my profile pic, the rest are in the beach trip album, i only got pics of 3 of the 6 i saw and was only to get a few good pics of only one snake because the others were farther in the swamp than i could get

They appear orange due to dried dirt (either due to clay soils or iron), if you were to rub one with a wet towel the mud would come off and they'd be normal in coloration and pattern. See below for an example:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/nclarkii/3148755334/in/photostream/

im not so sure that was the case here, even when they were in the water the colors didnt seem to fade, also the patterns were very visible. not to mention i did see one with normal black coloration, i would assume with it being in the same area it would accumulate the same dusting as the rest, i just wish i could post the pictures on here. thank you for your input it is extremely possible that its just dirt, i just like to think there is a small community of these snakes with this color trait, in this area even the eastern king snakes display noticeably different patterns

i forgot to mention its on the outer banks, there is no red clay

Post a photograph.