Description: Long, powerful constrictor with 3 different adult color patterns predominating: plain, striped and blotched. The plain is black often with whiteshowing between the scales. The striped is red, orange, yellow, brown, or gray with 4 dark stripes. Blotched is light gray, yellow, or brown with dark brown, gray or black blotches down the back. The underside is uniformly white, yellow, orange, or gray, often with dark mottling or checks. The belly scales are flat in the middle and the ends are sharply angled up. The underside of the tail is not striped. If present, a dark stripe through the eye does not reach the neck. All young are vividly blotched. The scales are weakly keeled in 25 - 33 rows and the anal plate is divided.
Habitat: Hardwoood forest, wooded canyons, swamps, rocky timbered upland, farmalnd, old fields, barnyards, from arid to wet situations. Found from sea level to 4,400 feet.
Breeding: Mates April to June and in autumn. A clutch of 5 to 30 smooth shelled oblong eggs that are 1½" to 2¼" long are laid in rotten logs, leaf litter, or under rocks from June to August. The eggs hatch on 7½ to 15½ weeks in August to September. Hatchlings are 11 to 16" long.
Range: Eastern Ontario and southern Vermont south to the Florida Keys, west to western Texas and adjacent Mexico, north to southwestern Minnesota and southern Michigan.
Diet: This species is a constrictor, meaning it suffocates its prey, coiling around small animals and tightening its grip until they can no longer draw breath, before eating them. Though they do consume mice and rats, the Black Rat Snakes will also hunt other snakes, chipmunks, squirrels, birds, and bird eggs.
Behavior: When startled, they may freeze and wrinkle themselves into a series of kinks. If they feel further threatened, they may flee quickly or vibrate their tails in dead leaves
Conservation Status: No major threats are known. This snake thrives on partial deforestation. Locally, some populations have declined as a result of extensive deforestation and various forms of intensive development.
Additonal Notes: The re-classification of Elaphe to Pantherophis, Mintonius, and Scotophis are all alternatives still being considered. Herpedia will continue to use Elaphe until such a time as the authorities can make a united decision
Subspecies:
Black Rat Snake (E.o. obsoleta) - plain black or with traces of white between the scales. Found from southern Vermont to North carolina coast, southwest to central Georgia, north to southcentral Illinois, south to northern Louisiana, and Oklahoma, north to southwestern Minnesota and southern Michigan. Photo...
Baird's Rat Snake (E.o. bairdi) - Brown to orange-brown with 4 dark stripes, with the upper pair being the darkest. Found from central Texas west to the Big Bend region and adjacent Mexico. Photo...
Texas Rat Snake (E.o. lindheimeri) - Yellow or grayish, with brown or blackish blotches often with orange showing between the scales. Found from southcentral Louisiana to eastcentral Texas. Photo...
Yellow Rat Snake (E.o. quadrivittata) - Tan, yellow, or yellowish-orange with 4 distinct stripes. The tonguw is black. Found from coastal North Carolina, SOuth Carolina, Georgia, and most of the Florida peninsula. Photo...
Everglades Rat Snake (E.o. rossalleni) - Red, red-orange, or orange with 4 faint stripes. The tongue is red. Found in the Everglades of Florida. Photo...
Gray Rat Snake (E.o. spiloides) - Whitish to gray with brown to dark gray blotches, occasionally with 4 strtipes on the neck. Found from southern Illinois and extreme southwestern Indiana south to Mississippi coast and east to southwestern Georgia and northwestern Florida panhandle. Photo...
