Prairie
chicken tracking day! I
love my day on the prairie. It is so
peaceful and there is always something interesting to observe. When I
hopped out of the tracking truck to open a pasture gate, I noticed that something in the
grass at the edge of the road looked “different”. What do you see here? I left the gate halfway open and grabbed my
camera from the truck.
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| Speckled Kingsnake |
It is a
Speckled Kingsnake, Lampropeltis getula
holbrooki. This is gorgeous, native,
non-venomous, East Texas snake. A few
years ago, there was a pair of mature Speckled Kingsnakes who liked to bask in
the garden and on the patio of the Prairie Preserve office. Those snakes
were 5-6 feet long. I am sure they
managed the rodent population efficiently.
This fellow
near the pasture gate was only about 3 feet long. I got close to snap a photo, but he did not
like that one bit. First he coiled
defensively, then he raised his head and made a hasty retreat. I assured him that I did not eat snakes, but
he was taking no chances. It was just as
well that he moved - as close as he was to the road, I might have accidentally driven
over him with the truck.
This is a
very attractive snake. The black dorsal scales have a spot of yellow –
a light on the shield if you will - thus the Latin name, Lampropeltis. Lampro refers
to torch or lamp. Peltis refers to a crescent-shaped shield.
Speckled Kingsnakes hunt by scent and
kill their prey by constriction. According to A field Guide to Snakes of
Texas by Alan Tennant, Speckled Kingsnakes eat small mammals, birds, lizards,
frogs, and turtle eggs. They also eat
other snakes including coral snakes, copperheads, and rattlesnakes. “Kingsnakes
are largely immune to Crotalid venom,” Tennant says. Cool, right?
King of the snakes!
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| Speckled Kingsnake, Lampropeltis getula holbrooki |
