Notes on the Common Rainbow Snake

A large "highway under construction" sign lay mostly submerged in the South Carolina slough, but the top corner was exposed and propped up by the road shoulder.

Gordy Johnston and I were hoping to find an eastern kingsnake on the grassy shoulder. Of course, we knew when we saw the nearly submerged sign that we would have to check beneath it for a water snake or two. We lifted the sign and the watery mud on which it lay harbored a snake all right, but one that was totally different from what had been expected.

Beneath the sign was a magnificent rainbow snake, Farancia e. erytrogramma. I stared in disbelief at the black and red linear pattern and spine-tipped tail of this beautiful denizen of marshland, riverine, and estuarine habitats, the first rainbow snake I had ever seen.

That first sighting was back in the early 1950s, a time when both the rainbow snakes and their prey-fish, the American eel, were actually common. Now, 60 years later, because of detrimental habitat modifications, both the snake and its food fish are quite uncommon. In fact, there are many field herpers of today who, despite searching diligently through habitat in locales known to have once supported these secretive snakes have failed to find them.

But while the populations of the common rainbow snake have undeniably declined, those of its more newly described southernmore relative, the southern Florida rainbow snake, seem to have been entirely extirpated. But that is another story.

More photos under the jump...

Author, photographer, and columnist Richard Bartlett is one of the most prolific writers on herpetological subjects in the 20th century. With hundreds of books and articles to their credit, Richard and his wife Pat have spent over four decades documenting reptiles both in the field and in captivity. For a list of their current titles, please visit their page in our bookstore.