Florida and Georgia Snake Identification

This section of my website contains photos of snakes which I have taken in Florida and Georgia.

I have followed these rules:

The snakes in the photos are alive.
All photos are shot in the wild. The snakes are not captive or restrained in any way. I do not touch snakes except to chase them off a road when I am done photographing them.
All the photos were taken by me.
No image was altered in any way other than cropping, darkening, lightening, blurring, and removing dust spots.

If I deviate from any of the above, it will be indicated in the photo caption.

Website written by Tom Spinker
see home page for e-mail address
Copyright © 2001 - 2007 All Rights Reserved.

This page last updated: 3 March 2007
Original website was released
10 Nov 2000.

I make no warranties as to the accuracy of any of the info on this website.

Home Lizards

Index to Snake Pages

I have grouped my snake photos, unscientifically, onto the following pages:

Florida Cottonmouth

Florida Rattlesnakes
Timber Rattlesnake, Dusky Pigmy Rattlesnake, Eastern Diamondback Rattlesnake (no photo)

Red/Black/Yellow Snakes
Coral Snake, Florida Scarlet Snake, Scarlet Kingsnake(no photo)

Rat and Corn Snakes
Rat and Corn Snakes Pantherophis.

Water Snakes
Nerodia

Racers
Everglades Racer and Southern Black Racer Coluber constrictor

Garter and Ribbon Snakes
Garter and Ribbon Snakes Thamnophis

Any other Snake
snakes other than those above.
Rough Green, Florida Scarlet, Striped Crayfish, Black Swamp, Eastern Mud, DeKay's, Ringneck, Kingsnake

Burmese Python
Pythons are possibly established in the Everglades.

You need a Field Guide !

Click on a book title to hop over to Amazon and buy one.

Snakes of North America: Eastern and Central Regions
by Alan Tennant and Dick Bartlett
Paperback 614 pages Dimensions (in inches): 1.45 x 8.40 x 6.32
Lone Star Books, August 2003

The photos are a bit smaller than in Tennant's "Snakes of Florida" book. Range maps give the USA range of the snake. The "Florida" book only gave the range in Florida. The photos and text are similar or identical to the "Florida" book. This book covers 196 species and subspecies of snakes in USA and Canada from Texas eastward.

Lone Star Field Guide Snakes of Florida
by Alan Tennant
December 2003, Paperback, 272 pages, Dimensions 8.25 x 5.50 (inches)
If you are only interested in Florida snakes, this is the ideal book. Describes 70 species and subspecies of snakes found in Florida

Florida Snakes: A Guide to their Identification and Habits
by Dick Bartlett and Patricia Bartlett

New book, just published November 2003
Just like Tennant's book, this covers snakes of Florida.
I prefer Tennant's book because the photos are larger and (generally) of better quality. Bartlett's book includes five introduced snakes not covered by Tennant (Burmese Python, Javan File Snake, Colombian Boa Constrictor, Ball Python, and California Kingsnake). Bartlett says that these snakes are encountered in the field often enough that they should be included in a field guide. Bartlett also includes legless lizards and worm lizards, which might be mistaken for snakes.

You need a field guide because:

A field guide contains all the species of snakes.
A field guide tells you what to look for to distinguish similar species.
A field guide provides range maps.
Snakes may vary greatly in appearance within a species. Often juvenile snakes have bright patterns which fade with age. A field guide will cover different colors and patters, at least in the text.

Species
There are 44 species of indigenous (native) snakes in Florida. This number keeps increasing because modern molecular analysis is showing that some snakes thought to be sub-species are actually distinct species.

In addition the Bartlett and Bartlett book describes six introduced species which are believed to be breeding in Florida. These are:

Burmese Python
Ball Python
Columbian Boa Constrictor
California Kingsnake
Brahminy Blind Snake
Javan File Snake

The following table lists the 44 species of indigenous Florida snakes. A species is identified by a two-word scientific name. The first word is the genus.

Species may be divided into sub-species. Each sub-species is identified with the addition of a third word to the scientific name.

I have grouped these 44 snake species into 37 types. Within a type there might be more than one species, but the species are so similar that a snake expert would need to put the snakes on an examination table to make a definate determination.

I did not include the introduced snakes.

Size / Range
The lengths are taken from Tennant field guide to Florida. Lengths are typical adult lengths -- not maximum possible lengths.

The range is the approximate range in the state of Florida.

Photo Manipulation
I shrank the images to reduce the file size so that I could put all the images on one page without keeping you waiting for several minutes. To reduce the size of the file, I eliminated the backgrounds.

Unlike the rest of this website, the images on this page have been digitally manipulated. Snakes have been flipped, so they all face to the right, and branches (etc) obscuring a snake have been filled-in.

I grouped the snakes as "Slender" "Heavy Bodied" etc based on my impressions of the appearance of the snake. My grouping may not be exact.

Small Burrowing Snakes

Crowned Snakes
Tantilla coronata uncommon
Tantilla relicta common
Tantilla oolitica extremely rare
Range:small ranges in central and northern Florida and along Atlantic coast
Length: less than 13 inches

Earth Snakes
Virginia striatula
Virginia valeria
Range: N Florida
Length: 7 - 13 inches

Brown Snake
(aka DeKay's Snake)
Storeria dekayi

Range: most of Florida
Length: 7 - 10 inches
Other Snakes

Redbelly Snake
Storeria occipitomaculata
Range: N Florida
Length: 8 - 10 inches

Very Slender Snakes

Rough Green Snake
Opheodrys aestivus

Range: All Florida
Length: 22 - 32 inches
This is the only bright green snake in Florida.
Other Snakes

Coachwhip
Masticophis flagellum
Range: all Florida
Length: 50 - 72 inches

Racer
Coluber constrictor

Range: all Florida
Length: 20 - 56 inches
Racers

Pine Woods Snake
Rhadinaea flavilata
Range: N & C Florida
Length: 10 - 12 inches

Scarlet Snake
Cemophora coccinea

Range: All Florida
Length: 14 - 32 inches
Red/Black/Yellow Snakes

Scarlet Kingsnake
Lampropeltis triangulum
Range: all Florida
Length: 14 - 20 inches
Red/Black/Yellow Snakes

Coral Snake
Micrurus fulvius

Range: all Florida
Length: 20 - 36 inches
venomous
Red/Black/Yellow Snakes

Ribbon Snake
Thamnophis sauritus

Range: all Florida
Length: 20 - 34 inches
Garter and Ribbon Snakes

Slender Snakes

Ringneck Snake
Diadophis punctatus

Range: all Florida
Length: under 10 inches
Other Snakes

Mole Kingsnake
Lampropeltis calligaster
Extremely rare in Florida and rare from Mississippi to Virginia
Length: 30 - 40 inches

Common Kingsnake
Lampropeltis getula

Range: all Florida
Length: 36 - 48 inches
Other Snakes

Garter Snake
Thamnophis sirtalis

Range: all Florida
Length: 20 - 28 inches
Garter and Ribbon Snakes

Corn Snake
Elaphe guttata

Range: all Florida
Length: 18 - 44 inches
Rat and Corn Snakes

Rat Snake
Elaphe obsoleta

Range: all Florida
Length: 36 - 72 inches
Rat and Corn Snakes

Short-tailed Snake
Stilosoma extenuatum
rare
Range: small range in N and Central Florida
Length: 14 - 20 inches

Medium Bodied Snakes

Mud Snake
Farancia abacura

Range: all Florida
Length: 36 - 52 inches
Other Snakes

Rainbow Snake
Farancia erytogramma
Range: north Florida
Length: 40 - 54 inches

Black Swamp Snake
Seminatrix pygaea

Range: all Florida
Length: 10 - 15 inches
Other Snakes

Queen/Crayfish Snakes
Regina rigida
Regina septemvittata
Regina alleni

Range: all Florida
Length: 14 - 23 inches
Other Snakes

Heavy Bodied Snakes

Eastern Indigo
Drymarchon corais
Range: all Florida
Length: 60 - 74 inches

Hognose Snakes
Heterodon simus
Heterodon platirhinos

Range: all Florida
Length: 20 - 33 inches
Other Snakes

Pine Snake
Pituophis melanoleucus
rare
Range: north and central Florida
Length: 36 - 60 inches

Southern Water Snake
Nerodia fasciata

Subspecies:
N f fasciata
N f pictiventris Banded Water Snake
Florida Banded Water Snake
Range: all Florida
Length: 22 - 40 inches
Water Snakes

Green Water Snake
Nerodia floridana Florida Green Water Snake
Nerodia cyclopian Mississippi Green Water Snake

Range: almost all Florida
Length: 30 - 55 inches
Water Snakes

Brown Water Snake
Nerodia taxispilota

Range: all Florida
Length: 30 - 55 inches
Water Snakes

Plain-bellied Water Snake
Nerodia erythrogaster
Range: NW Florida
Length: 28 - 48 inches

Northern Water Snake
Nerodia sipedon
Range: extreme NW Florida
Length: 24 - 48 inches

Mangrove Water Snake
Nerodia clarkii

Salt Water
Range: all coastal areas
Length: 15 - 30 inches
Water Snakes

Cottonmouth
Agkistrodon piscivorous

Range: all Florida
Length: up to 38 inches
venomous
Florida Cottonmouth

Copperhead
Agkistrodon contortrix
Range: small area around Apalachicola River
Length: 24 - 36 inches
venomous

Pigmy Rattlesnake
Sistrusus miliarius

Range: all Florida
Length: up to 20 inches
venomous
Florida Rattlesnakes

Timber Rattlesnake
Crotalus horridus

Range: north Florida
Length: 30 - 48 inches
venomous
Florida Rattlesnakes

Eastern Diamondback Rattlesnake

Crotalus adamanteus
Range: all Florida
Length: 32 - 48 inches
venomous
Florida Rattlesnakes

Eastern Glass Lizard
Ophisaurus ventralis

Not a snake. A legless lizard
size: 19 - 28 inches
Florida Lizards

Other webpages for snake identification:
These are external links to other pages which present small photos of the different snake species of Florida.

Snakes of Duval County
Duval County is around Jacksonville

Snakes of Lake Woodruff National Wildlife Refuge
North part of Florida peninsula -- inland from Daytona Beach

Snakes of Brevard County
Photos are large. May take time to download. Brevard County is on the Atlantic coast at about the mid-point of the peninsula.

Even more important than a field guide to snakes is a DeLorme atlas. If you only own one book, it should be a DeLorme atlas. You need one to be able to explore a state.

(This has nothing to do with snakes. It is an atlas.)

A book with spectacular photos is Florida's Fabulous Reptiles and Amphibians by P. Carmichael and W. Williams. (Click on title to hop over to Amazon.) Book is the size of a magazine with 120 pages. Does not have the scientific rigor of the Tennant book; just buy it for the photos. Has photos of 51 species and sub-species of snakes; plus lizards, turtles, alligators, amphibians.

My testimonial and sales pitch for the Garmin GPS Receiver
You need to buy one of these now. Price has come way down.

Home Lizards