please help identify:

[zeewhiz]

Hey everybody,

A friend of mine's daughter went camping this past weekend on a lake here in upstate, sc. She caught a snake and was wanting me to help identify it. Since I can't put a positive ID on it, I was wondering if you guys could help. The pics arent the best, but here they are:

 

[Toshiro]

a Fox snake?

 

[JoshnJJ]

Look like a black rat snake.
It's a baby, we get them here all the time.
You can keep it as a pet, but they grow up to max of 8 feet.
I want one because they are black when they reach adulthood,
and also you can still see the pattern like that on adult when you look
very closely.

 

[JoshnJJ]

And btw, there's no Fox snake in SC and NC.

 

[Toshiro]

And btw, there's no Fox snake in SC and NC.

Everyday we learn stuff.

 

[zeewhiz]

its not a black rat, thats for sure.... (I have one, lol) I went to this page, and I'm thinking its a northern water snake.

http://www.snakesandfrogs.com/scra/snakes/nortwtr.htm

heres the main page of SC snakes and frogs:

http://www.snakesandfrogs.com/scra/snakes/scsnake.htm

 

[JoshnJJ]

Was it found nearby a river or lake?
I looked up at the pictures, there's no watersnake match.

 

[JoshnJJ]

I don't really know, it's hard to tell by this youth

 

[zeewhiz]

yeah, she caught it while camping at a lake.

 

[zeewhiz]

this is a juvie Northern water snake, notice the belly pattern similarities.... I still don't know though. I did send an email to the person that runs that site, so we'll see what happens with that.

 

[JoshnJJ]

Well, there is a high chance that you are right, it might be northern water snake.
I've always want to get one to keep it...
Hell, there's so many snakes that I would love to keep to take care for alittle while...

 

[JoshnJJ]

Oh I just noticed the pattern, end of the snake's body is very similiar with that snake posted in picture, you can tell..
The upper part seems like copperhead's pattern going to half-way, then make a broken bands. There is high chance it is the same one.

 

[tyflier]

Looks like a hatchling Black Racer, to me. Was it out and active during the day? Did it take a couple strikes at you? I could be wroing...Eastern U.S. species are certainly not my specialty...but that would be my guess...

This is a picture I found of one:

Borrowed from KentuckySnakes.org.

 

[Nanci]

I don't know, Chris. Something seems weird about the back pattern.

This is a juvie black racer I found:

 

[Nanci]

Here's a different black racer:

 

[Nanci]

Belly shot: And they BITE!!!

 

[Nanci]

I don't know, maybe...

 

[Allison]

Im going with water snake. The first link that Zeewhiz posted contains another link to a young form of the same snake. Its a neat find!

 

[Nanci]

I vote against water snake. it just isn't heavy-bodied enough, and doesn't have that blocky head. It has a very ratsnake-like head, to me.

 

[El Jefe]

My guess:
Nerodia sipedon Northern water snake