‹ Compare two snakes
Timber Rattlesnake vs Gray Ratsnake
(c) Evan M. Raskin, some rights reserved (CC BY)
Timber Rattlesnake
Crotalus horridus
Venomous(c) Dominic Gentilcore, some rights reserved (CC BY)
Gray Ratsnake
Pantherophis spiloides
Non-venomousThe quick way to tell
Look at the tail. The Timber Rattlesnake has a rattle and vertical pupils. The Gray Ratsnake's tail tapers to a point, and its pupils are round.
Tail ★ This settles it
Solid black ahead of the rattle.
Tapers evenly; no rattle.
Head
Heavy triangular head, much wider than the neck, usually with no bold cheek stripe.
Narrow head barely wider than the neck; white to cream chin.
Pattern
Dark chevrons - V shapes pointing forward - and often a rusty spine stripe.
Dark gray or brown blotches on a gray to brownish back; some northern adults turn nearly black.
Eyes
Vertical slit pupil; heat-sensing pit between eye and nostril.
Round pupil, fairly large 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.
What it does
Very reluctant; usually lies still or rattles long before striking.
An excellent climber; bluffs with a tail buzz in leaf litter.
Where it lives
Eastern US from New Hampshire and New York south to northern Florida, west to Minnesota, Iowa, Kansas and east Texas.
Appalachians west to the Mississippi: Florida panhandle, Alabama and Mississippi north through Tennessee, Kentucky, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio and Michigan to Wisconsin and Ontario.