Cottonmouth Water Moccasin Snakes, Wall Doxey State Park, Mississippi!

We saw these water snakes in Mississippi. We don't know snakes, so we assumed they were venomous and kept our distance. Later we found out they are cottonmouths water moccasin.

Category:

Pets & Animals

Tags:

• water
• snake
• moccasin
• cottonmouth
• swamp
• Mississippi
• Wall
• Doxey
• State
• Park
• nature
• wildlife
• pit
• viper
• venemous
• outdoors
• wilderness
• wassermokassinotter
• wassermokassinschlange
• grubenotter
• giftschlange

[HawgtiedXX]

a couple of those were water snakes.....hard to tell the difference....have to look at his eyes....if round = water snake  if diamond shaped = death

[ronsig]

@HawgtiedXX Thanks, don't want to get close enough to look at eyes, lol.

[Sarnamia]

@HawgtiedXX Those are all Cotton Mouths. A couple of them are juveniles with a more striped pattern. Also, the pupil theory dosen't help as they widen and constrict with mood/light/ect to the point where they can be round. Besides elapids (cobras, mambas, Taipans), which are more venomous on average, have round pupils. The coral snake is the only Elapid in North America.

[ronsig]

@Sarnamia Thank you for the information!

[clevenger013]

who wants to go swimming? lol

[ronsig]

@clevenger013 They used to allow swimming there!

[magicksinger1]

Yup, water moccasins, and their venom is deadly. I am glad you kept your distance!

[Sarnamia]

@ronsig You're welcome. :)

[doctorfeelucky]

I remember fishing with my dad and brother at a creek of the Pearl River in the middle of mating season. Everywhere we looked, there was either a water snake or cottonmouth. They were EVERYWHERE!!

[Snakeman418]

@ronsig dont completely listen to JBeazer74, watersnakes will triangulate their heads when threatened in order to appear like cottonmouths, watersnakes are also much more aggressive. cottonmouths are stout, with fat heads, all the time. watersnakes, once calm, have skinny heads but very triangular if scared.. pitvipers (ie cottonmouth) have elliptical cat-like pupils while watersnakes and all other southeast nonvenomous snakes have round human-like pupils, there are no exceptions in SE

[doyle178]

@JBeazer74 Since when are coral snakes rare?? They are elusive, but by no means rare within their range. I've found as many as 30 in a day at times, you just need to know where to look. Your info on pit viper identification is correct, but also flawed as several nonvenomous snakes have that same appearance. Nerodia (watersnakes) flatten their head to resemble a pit viper when threatened. I've seen dozens of nerodia (blotched, yellow bellied, etc.) misidentified by "experts" as cottonmouths.