‹ Compare two snakes
Eastern Copperhead vs Eastern Milksnake
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(c) Court Harding, some rights reserved (CC BY)
Eastern Copperhead
Agkistrodon contortrix
Venomous(c) Daniel J. Layton, some rights reserved (CC BY)
Eastern Milksnake
Lampropeltis triangulum
Non-venomousThe quick way to tell
The milksnake has black-edged reddish saddles on a gray body. The copperhead has hourglass bands pinched at the spine and a plain copper head.
Pattern ★ This settles it
Dark hourglass bands - wide at the sides, pinched to a narrow waist over the spine.
Reddish-brown saddles edged in black on gray; checkerboard belly.
Head
Plain coppery triangular head with no stripes or blotches, clearly wider than the neck.
Small head, often with a pale Y or V mark on the back of it.
Eyes
Vertical slit pupil; heat-sensing pit between eye and nostril.
Round pupil, small dark eye; no heat-sensing pit.
Pits
A deep heat-sensing pit on each side of the face, between the eye and the nostril.
None. There is no pit between the eye and the nostril.
Tail
Plain; young have a bright yellow tail tip.
Tapers evenly; no rattle - but it vibrates the tip.
What it does
Freezes rather than fleeing - which is why people step on them.
Vibrates its tail and musks; often found in basements and walls.
Where it lives
Eastern US from Massachusetts and New York south to the Florida panhandle, west to Iowa, eastern Kansas, Oklahoma and eastern Texas.
Northeast and Midwest: Maine and Ontario west to Minnesota and Iowa, south through the Appalachians to northern Georgia and Alabama, and down the Mississippi valley to Missouri, northern Arkansas and eastern Kansas.