Can anyone ID this snake?

one way to tell poisonous from harmless is slant eye pupil mean bad news, and round pupil is harmless. I won't kill a black snake, garter snake, etc... they help with mice control, etc... a Black snake will even kill a Copperhead

Edit: Forgot about the Coral snake has round pupils and is poisonous. But you have to live where those are to even worry about it

 

x2

 

I was always told arrow shape head is venomous

 

Well yeah, but some can fool you simply because it is a fat snake. but yes... The poisonous snakes have a wide triangle shaped head. Poisonous also have heat sensing pits on around their nose. Their nose is also pointy vs. the harmless round nosed snakes.

 

Never understood all the rules around identifying venomous snakes. Learn what a copperhead looks like. Learn what a cottonmouth looks like. Rattlesnakes are obvious. So are coral snakes. What else is there?

Unless you come across exotics, then the rules don't apply anyway. One of my favorites from back when I was in college:

 

When I was a kid I had one just like that in the pic, except he was over 5 feet long. Thing was so fat it didn't care, made a decent pet.. LoL

 

Blunt tales and pointed heads, most of them are pit vipers. If they have a pointed tale they are harmless.

 

^ ooorah to that

 

Found this guy not too long ago in a basement in Hubbardston, MA. Didn't mess with it, but threw a stone towards him and off he went.

 

Ha! Ironically, this one I know...Milk Snake...Supposedly as beneficial as garters. I've seen them sell at pet stores for $60

 

haha ablack snake where i live is probably a water moccasin, south louisiana swamps and woods present some interesting reptiles, when it floods they climb up the trees, nothing more disconcerting to be walking in the woods and see a four foot water moccasin looking at you at eye level, or fall out of the tree next to you, i've had them come at me before, around here the only good snake is a dead snake haha

 

Shoot! I should of wrangled him in and sold him on the market. I wonder if pet stores will buy animals and sell them at a higher price from the general public....

 

doubt it, im sure theres some regulation that the snakes have to be domestically bred in order to be sure that they arent carrying any diseases that wild snakes might have

 

I kill any snake I see. I didn't used to be that way, but now that I have little kids, I don't know, better safe then sorry. I mean, it's in the Bible...."They will bruise your heel and you will crush their head." boom.

 

which translates to "they'll bite your kids and you'll shoot them" 'murica

 

I have a simple rule regarding snakes. If I am in their environment - i.e. in the woods, on a river, etc, I give them a wide berth and leave them alone. If it is poisonous and in my yard, it's dead. If it found its way there once, it will again. If it's not poisonous and is in my yard, I leave it be since most snakes keep the rodent population in check. YMMV.