And also hiding in the leaf litter

Stepping off the trail to get a closer look at the creek, this guy suddenly slithered out and into the creek.

Not a copperhead, he's a Northern Water Snake. But that didn't stop our hearts from racing at the surprise.

 

Snakes in the grass

Walking along a path beside the pond at Prairie Ridge Ecostation, we found these two.  I had heard that black rat snakes will eat other snakes, but here's the proof.  

The unfortunate snake is probably a brown snake. (here)

The hungry snake is definitely a black rat snake (here),  He watched us closely and shook his tail to scare us off.

 

Copperhead

It's not so fun to see this guy sunning on a culvert.  We walked much more carefully after seeing him.

Black Rat Snake

This large black rat snake crawled across our trail, out into the forest floor.  He stopped, raised his head like he was looking at something, and then lowered his head and moved on.  I watched the trail for crawling things the rest of the hike!

Little green snake

This little guy moved across the leaf litter into a tree.  He's a Rough Green Snake. (Here) We watched him climb up into a tree and then across to a vine.  It makes me wonder how many other creatures are in the forest that we never see.

Copperhead

Taking an evening walk, we ran into this guy.  He wasn't very big, you can compare him to the blades of grass in the picture (about a foot long).  But he is definitely a copperhead with his triangular head and hourglass markings.  He didn't like the camera flash and slid into the grass next to the sidewalk.

I've been watching where I walk all the time now!

Little Snake

This little guy was about the size of a large worm.  But he's definately a snake.  I think he's a Red Bellied Snake, native to North Carolina (here).  His favorite food is slugs, snails and rolly pollies.  I hope he's hungry.

S is for snake

Not a copper head I'm happy to say.  This Northern Water Snake was sleeping on a rock by Abbot's creek.