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 Banded Water Snake (Nerodia fasciata fasciata)

Banded Water Snake | Nerodia fasciata-fasciata photo
Southern Water Snake
Photograph by Public Health Image Library (PHIL). License: Public Domain.  (view image details)








BANDED WATER SNAKE FACTS
Description
The Banded Water Snake is a stocky snake with black, brown, or red crossbands across the back. The background color varies from gray, yellow, tan, or reddish. The underside is pale with roughly square shaped spots. The snake may darken, and crossbands become more like the background color with age. There is a dark stripe from the eye to the angle of the jaw. Juveniles have prominent dark crossbands on a pale background. It is mainly active at night, but may be seen during the day sunning itself on banks or vegetation overhanging the water.

Other Names
Southern Water Snake

Size
length 60cm - 105cm. Can grow to 150cm.

Environment
freshwater ponds, lakes, streams, rivers, marshes.

Food
eats fish, frogs, salamanders, crayfish, tadpoles.

Breeding
The Banded Water Snake bears 20 - 30 live young. The young are born in summer and are 19cm - 24cm long.

Range
Florida panhandle to North Carolina and west to south west parts of Alabama.

Notes
The Banded Water Snake is harmless, although when threatened it will bite readily and excrete a foul smelling musk.

Classification
Class:Reptilia
Order:Squamata (Serpentes)
Family:Colubridae
Genus:Nerodia
Species:fasciata fasciata
Common Name:Banded Water Snake


Relatives in same Genus
  Mangrove Salt Marsh Snake (N. clarkii compressicauda)
  Atlantic Salt Marsh Snake (N. clarkii taeniata)
  Redbelly Water Snake (N. erythrogaster erythrogaster.)
  Florida Banded Water Snake (N. fasciata pictiventris)
  Diamondback Water Snake (N. rhombifer)
  Northern Water Snake (N. sipedon)







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