Scales: Keeled

Anal Plate: Divided

Reproduction: ovoviviparous

The Broad-banded Water Snake is arguably the prettiest species of Nerodia. Its stunning mixiture of brown, black and yellow makes it a very attractive snake.

This species can be found in throughout the lower mississippi river valley. From East Texas to western Mississippi and north to southern tip of Illinois.

They are usually around two to three feet in length. Like other water snakes, this species feeds mainly on fish and amphibians.

Broad-banded Water Snakes has had several different common and latin names since Raymond L. Ditmar's A Field Good of North American Snakes. In his book, the snake was called the Blanchard's Water Snake (Natrix sipedon confluens). Two years later, Karl P. Schmidt and D. Wright Davis called it the Mississippi River Water Snake in their Field Book of Snakes of the United States and Canada (1941). By 1958, Roger Conant called it the Broad-banded Water Snake in his A Field Guide to Reptiles and Amphibians of the United Sates and Canada East of the 100th Meridian. In 1963, Conant elevated it to species status and fasciata was given as the species name. Later the genus name Natrix was changed to Nerodia (New World water snakes).

This species can hybridize with Nerodia clarkii and Nerodia sipedon in areas where the range overlap (Gibbons & Dorcas 2004).

References