‹ Compare two snakes
Eastern Copperhead vs Northern Watersnake
Tap a part to see it on both. Tap it again to turn it off.
(c) Court Harding, some rights reserved (CC BY)
Eastern Copperhead
Agkistrodon contortrix
VenomousMartyn Drabik-Hamshare, no rights reserved
Northern Watersnake
Nerodia sipedon
Non-venomousThe quick way to tell
Look at the bands from above. The copperhead's pinch to a narrow waist over the spine, like an hourglass. The watersnake's don't.
Pattern ★ This settles it
Dark hourglass bands - wide at the sides, pinched to a narrow waist over the spine.
Crossbands up front breaking into blotches toward the tail; reddish half-moons on the belly.
Head
Plain coppery triangular head with no stripes or blotches, clearly wider than the neck.
Narrow head barely wider than the neck; flattens when threatened.
Eyes
Vertical slit pupil; heat-sensing pit between eye and nostril.
Round pupil, eyes set high on the head; 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.
What it does
Freezes rather than fleeing - which is why people step on them.
Basks on docks and banks; drops into water, bites hard if grabbed.
Where it lives
Eastern US from Massachusetts and New York south to the Florida panhandle, west to Iowa, eastern Kansas, Oklahoma and eastern Texas.
Eastern and central US from Maine and Ontario south to the Carolinas and the Gulf states (just into the Florida panhandle), west to Colorado, Nebraska and Oklahoma; introduced in California.