new pics of shorthead garter snakes

[annulataarethebest]

Went herping today locally for the first time in probably 3 years, only went to one spot, which is just one street leading to a business and the right side of the street is a wooded hillside. There was a lot of vegetation on the good side of the road and most of the boards that I remember being there were no longer there. But the bigger rocks were. First snake I found was a DOR 15" eastern garter snake, didn't get any pics of it.
Lifted a small rock and found the first live snakes of the day, 3 shorthead garter snakes. 2 of them were far too jumpy to get any good pics, got 1 picture of the biggest one of those 3 after it crapped on itself.

The next snake was found by my brother, an adult in shed sitting out in the open just 10 feet from the rock I just flipped.
Not a good picture, but the best of the 3 pics he took of this snake.
As found

A small board turned up another couple of shortheads. Got pics of this one.

We spent the next hour relocating boards so hopefully we can find more snakes next time. Then we went further up to the top of the street which is away from the patch of woods and next to an abandoned warehouse. There used to be a lot of snakes around the warehouse but they cleaned up a lot of the debris. All of the next snakes were found in the warehouse parking lot.
Here's a young shorthead, last year's baby, with a faded stripe.

And an adult shorthead from the same spot with a faded stripe. They don't ever sit still, and if they do they try to hide their head.

One board that I flipped in the parking lot had at least a dozen shortheads underneath as well as a handful of brown snakes.
Decent shot of another young shorthead.


Pretty typical day in that area, all in all we probably found a little over 20 shorthead garters, less than 10 northern brown snakes, 3 DOR shortheads and a DOR eastern garter. We also missed 4 or 5 snakes that were crawling out in the open that were assumed to be shortheads. I'll be back within a week with more pics.

[guidofatherof5]

Thanks Mike. We don't hear much about Shorthead garters (Thamnophis brachystoma )
Looks a lot like Butler's garter snake (T.butleri)

[kibakiba]

They also look like northwesterns, tiny head and all

[Eddie]

Sounds like a great day of garter hunting. I went last weekend and found 1 short head and 1 eastern in a spot that I have found many of both types over the years. I have found them together under the same boards on many occasions. They do not seem to intergrade from what I can see. I guess the different pheromones keep them in check.
I was actually looking for box turtles when I found them. I just can't resist flipping boards. lol
Ed

[ConcinusMan]

Looks a lot like Butler's garter snake (T.butleri)

They also look like northwesterns, tiny head and all

Not surprising. DNA testing reveals that those three are very close to being the same snake.

Butlers and shortheads are extremely close, with ordinoides being a close cousin of those two.