‹ Compare two snakes
Red-bellied Snake vs Ring-necked Snake
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Red-bellied Snake
Storeria occipitomaculata
Non-venomous(c) Zakqary Roy, some rights reserved (CC BY)
Ring-necked Snake
Diadophis punctatus
Mildly venomousThe quick way to tell
Look at the neck. The Red-bellied Snake usually has three pale spots or a faint light collar on a brown or gray body. The Ring-necked Snake has a bold, sharp yellow-orange ring around the neck on a smooth slate-gray to black body.
Pattern ★ This settles it
Plain brown, gray, reddish or blackish back, sometimes with a paler stripe down the middle and faint thin dark stripes. The belly is bright red or orange with no spots (sometimes pink, yellow or black).
Plain slate gray with a bright yellow to red neck ring and matching belly.
Head
Head is often darker than the body (dark brown to black), with a light collar or three pale spots just behind it and white on the chin and throat.
Small plain head, no wider than the neck.
Eyes
—
Round pupil, small dark eye; no heat-sensing pit.
Pits
None. There is no pit between the eye and the nostril.
None. There is no pit between the eye and the nostril.
Tail
Short and thin, colored like the body, with the red belly color continuing underneath.
Short, brightly coloured underneath; no rattle.
What it does
Very secretive, hiding under logs, rocks and leaf litter. It very rarely bites; when bothered it curls its upper lip, may release musk, flatten its body or play dead.
Curls its tail into a tight coil to show the bright underside.
Where it lives
Eastern US from the Dakotas, Minnesota and Maine south to northern Florida and eastern Texas, with an isolated group in the Black Hills of South Dakota and Wyoming. Also southeastern Canada (Saskatchewan to Nova Scotia).
Most of the US except the northern plains and driest desert, plus southern Canada and parts of Mexico.