Scott, The coral snakes are "supposed to" stay on the Texas side of the Red River, and we're surrounded by the river and by Texas to our west, south and east....and in 16 years of living here, and 18 years of owning this land, I've never seen a coral snake here in OK yet. I hope those coral snakes understand that they are supposed to stay over in Texas and not come here. Still, I remain conscious of the fact that the river (which often is pretty much dry in places for much of the summer) will not stop the snakes, so we still could encounter them here. I hope if I ever see one, it is from a great distance so I have time to recite to myself "Red on yellow, kill a fellow, Red on black, venom lack" and then I can study it and decide if it is venomous and if I should be worried. On our property, we have had, at various times, encounters with western diamondbacks, pygmy rattlers, timber rattlers, copperheads and water moccasins. The water moccasins weren't a problem very often since they stuck to bodies of water. However, after Extreme and Exceptional Drought continually dried up most of our ponds and our creeks, they moved to the ornamental lily pond in our back yard. After fighting them there for several years, we let the pond dry up last year and this year we filled it in. I miss my lily pond but it wasn't worth the risk. My closest encounter with a snake was with a pygmy rattler, which was about 2" from my hand. I rarely see those, though, unless I venture into the woods, and I rarely see a western diamondback other than sleeping on the rocks in a sunny spot alongside the creek. The copperheads often are found on the 'edges', like where the grassland meets the woodland and we most often encounter them while mowing. The timber rattlers, though, are a very persistent problem. They come out of our neighbor's woodland to our south, travel across his cow pasture with grass waist high or higher, and then come onto our property, where we most often encounter them in the driveway, in the veggie garden or near the chicken coop. They seem to travel the same little trails that the deer and rabbits use, so at least I know exactly where I am most likely to see one. Over the weekend, one of my neighbors asked me if I had a snake-free summer, because normally he is the person who will come and shoot a snake for me if I am home alone and encounter one when I don't have a gun with me. I told him that I had plenty of snake encounters, including the one with the timber rattler last week, but this year the snakes scheduled all their visits for days with my husband or son were home. When we first moved here, my experience with venomous snakes was fairly limited and I would run into the house and grab a gun and come back out to shoot it, and of course the snake wouldn't be there. I laugh at myself now when I think of that because I guess I thought the snake would just sit there and wait for me to come back and kill it. Obviously, they don't do that. It has taken me a long time to accept the fact that snakes always will be in my garden at times, but I just try to take it with a grain of salt when I see a non-venomous snake in the garden. I know they are good garden helpers and aren't going to hurt me. We often have rough green tree snakes in the garden where they like to sit wrapped around the canna leaves waiting for something delicious to come along for dinner. They also like to sit up in tomato cages and will travel across the shade cloth I put over tomato cages in the worst heat of the summer in a drought year. It is sort of disconcerting to be picking tomatoes and to look up and see a green snake at eye level, but I've gotten used to it. Dawn

I have caught and owned probably thousands of Eastern Garters, as well as other species of Thamnophis, over the decades, and been bitten more times than I can even count, but I have NEVER, ever had a snake bite become infected, especially not one from one of the Natricine snakes, like Garters or Water Snakes. Snakes in this family actually are mildly venomous, and do possess a Duvernoy's gland, which is the evolutionary predecessor to a fully-developed venom gland, but their venom is very mild and has a poor delivery system, via grooved, enlarged "fangs" near the rear of the upper jaw. However, that venom does contain components which act as both a mild anticoagulant and an antibacterial. Bites bleed quite freely for a few minutes, in relation to the bite itself, which is barely felt, and these two seem to combine to inhibit infection. I get bitten out in the field most often, miles away from any soap and water or peroxide, and have never had a bite get infected. In fact, I don't know of any fellow snake keepers/field herpetologists who have, even with getting bitten while our arms are covered in mud and muck from a swamp!

Sharp-tailed Snake (Contia tenuis). Harmless slug eaters.

I assume that is a captive snake (or an escaped captive). While the pattern and coloration might first suggest that it is a striped morph California Kingsnake (Lampropeltis getula), the head shape and pattern tells a different story. The head shape looks to me like that of a milksnake (Lampropeltis triangulum). Therefore I am pretty sure this is one of the captive hybrids between a Cal King and a Milksnake.