I found this common snapping turtle in the middle of the road yesterday on my way to work. I picked it up and released it into a nearby pond before it was run over.

San Francisco Garter Snake my friend found in Petaluma, California.

Photo by Tamar Ingber

Garter snake I found on my way home from work in Blue Ash, Ohio.

Same baby garter snake in Blue Ash, OH.

Baby brown Garter snake I found in my garage in Blue Ash, OH

Northern water snake I found at the Patapsco River in Maryland.

Photo By Andrea Staros

Backyard Creature Of The Week:

The Northern water snake (Nerodia sipedon) is a large, nonvenomous, well-known snake in the Colubridae family that is native to North America. They are active during the day and at night. They are most often seen basking on rocks, stumps, or brush. During the day, they hunt among plants at the water’s edge, looking for small fish, frogs, worms, leeches, crayfish, salamanders, small birds and mammals. At night, they concentrate on minnows and other small fish sleeping in shallow water. The Northern water snake can grow up to 135 cm (4.4 ft) long. They can be brown, gray, reddish, or brownish-black. They have dark crossbands on their necks and dark stripes and blotches on the rest of their bodies, often leading to misidentification as cottonmouths or copperheads (Wiki.)

My Black Mexican Kingsnake

ODB, My Black Mexican Kingsnake

Photo By Disposable City

Checkered Garter Snake in Ellicott City, Md.

Photo By Andrea Staros

Backyard Creature Of The Week:

The common snapping turtle (Chelydra serpentina) is a large freshwater turtle of the family Chelydridae. Its natural range extends from southeastern Canada, southwest to the edge of the Rocky Mountains, as far east as Nova Scotia and Florida and as far southwest as northeastern Mexico. Chelydra serpentina have rugged, muscular builds with ridged carapaces (though ridges tend to be more pronounced in younger individuals). C. serpentina and its subspecies commonly weigh 4.5–16 kg (9.9–35 lb). Common snappers are noted for their belligerent disposition when out of the water, their powerful beak-like jaws, and their highly mobile head and neck (hence the specific name “serpentina”, meaning “snake-like”). Common habitats are shallow ponds, shallow lakes, or streams. Some may inhabit brackish environments, such as estuaries. Snapping turtles are omnivores, consuming both plant and animal matter, and are important aquatic scavengers; but they are also active hunters that prey on anything they can swallow, including many invertebrates, fish, frogs, reptiles (including snakes and smaller turtles), unwary birds, and small mammals. (Wiki.)

Backyard Creature Of The Week:

The Garter snake is a Colubrid snake genus (Thamnophis) common across North America, ranging from Alaska and Canada to Central America. It is the single most widely distributed genus of reptile in North America. Their diet consists of almost any creature that they are capable of overpowering: slugs, earthworms, leeches, lizards, amphibians, birds, fish, toads and rodents. When living near the water, they will eat other aquatic animals. Garters were long thought to be nonvenomous, but recent discoveries have revealed that they do in fact produce a mild neurotoxic venom.^[4] Garter snakes cannot kill humans with the small amounts of venom they produce, which is comparatively mild, and they also lack an effective means of delivering it. They do have enlarged teeth in the back of their mouth, but their gums are significantly larger. (Wiki.)

Green Boa

Rainbow Boa

Snake’s Blue Tongue