COMMON NORTH AMERICAN SPECIES 



345 



will leap wildly from the edge of a rock or a steep 

 bank in order to escape. If cornered, it makes 

 a fierce but often absurd fight, sometimes be- 



WESTERN COACH-WHIP SNAKE, OR BED RACER. 



coming so frantic that it bites its own body. (R. 

 L. Ditmars.) 



This snake is a good climber, swims well, and 

 is active and quick in movement, but it has no 

 real power to speak of. It is not an enemy of 

 the rattlesnake, as many persons suppose, but 

 it devours snakes that are smaller and weaker 

 than itself. Its favorite food consists of small 

 rodents, young birds, eggs and frogs, but it does 

 not eat fish. It is a great destroyer of mice and 

 moles, and deserves well of the farmer on that 

 account. 



The young differ in color from adult specimens, 

 being slaty gray, with chestnut-brown saddles on 

 the back. In the third year, these colors fade, 

 and the snake assumes its adult color. Speak- 

 ing generally, the black form of this species oc- 

 curs nearly everywhere throughout the United 

 States cast of the Mississippi into New England. 

 What is called the intermediate color is too widely 

 scattered to be defined, while the green-and-yel- 

 low form is found from Nebraska and Louisiana 

 westward to the Pacific coast, and from Puget 

 Sound to San Diego. 



The length of this snake, when adult, varies 

 from 40 to 58 inches. 



The Coach-Whip Snake^ is closely related 

 1 Za-me'nis fla-gel'lum. 



to the preceding species (both being members of 

 the same genus), and has similar habits. It is 

 even more slender than the black-snake. Its 

 standard color is, toward the head, black or 

 light yellowish-brown, fading out rapidly back- 

 ward, until the tail becomes nearly white. But 

 these colors vary exceedingly in widely separated 

 localities. 



This is a southern snake,' and extends from 

 Florida quite across the continent to California. 

 In the far Southwest, its colors are so much suf- 

 fused with pinkish it becomes the Red Racer 

 {Zamenis flageUum fre-na'tum). 



The Garter-Snake,^ our oldest and most fa- 

 miliar friend among the snakes, is as harmless as 

 a house-fly, and any one who exerts himself to 

 crush one simply makes a pitiful exhibition of 

 ignorance and folly. This is the most prolific 

 and generally abundant snake in North America, 

 and no amount of persecution seems to diminish 

 its numbers to any noticeable degree. During 

 the month of March, 1903, about 450 specimens 

 were collected in and around the Zoological 

 Park. 



This serpent is viviparous, and sometimes 

 forty-five are born in one brood. Out of a brood 

 of thirty-eight born in our Reptile House, there 

 was one double-headed specimen and three albi- 

 nos. The standard length of this snake is from 

 24 to 30 inches, and one 36 inches long is a large 

 specimen. Of the genus to which the Garter- 

 Snake belongs, twenty-four species have been 

 described, covering the whole of the United 



CO.MMOX GAUTEH-SNAKB. 



States, and much contiguous territory. From 



the species named above, twelve tiresome sub- 



^ Eti-tae' ni-a sir-lal'is. 



