I found this little guy at the entrance to my garage.

A long time ago, we had a yard man who looked exactly like Mr. Clean. He was at our house one day when I stepped over a really long snake to get to back yard. He about had a heart attack on the spot. It was worse when I stepped back over the snake to find out what all the fuss was about.

Turned out Mr. Clean thought the snake was venomous. I didn't - I already knew that there were only 3 venomous snakes in our state, and that this was not one of them. The herpetologist at the Science Museum told me that, and that I'd be really super lucky if I ever saw one. That is not the kind of luck I'm shooting for!

The snake turned out to be nonvenomous. But it did have the exactly opposite markings and colors of the snake Mr. Clean was thinking of. He just hadn't been to the science museum and encountered the herpetologist.
 
And you might not want to get close enough to check coloration....

I particularly would not want to get close enough to check this helpful advice found on the web:


Poisonous Snake Eyes Pupils are Elliptical


Instead of having round pupils, a venomous snake has slit-like elliptical eyes that resemble cat ’s eyes.
 
Interesting timing.
I just found a cute baby Gopher Snake on my walk this evening. I picked him up & he immediately calmed down. I took him on the rest of my walk & let anyone who wasn't scared pet him. I was surprised at how many woman & kids wanted to touch him. Well, one woman actually asked me if he was venomous. 😊
This one:
baby Gopher snake
 

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