Caught Baby Rattlesnake

I was recently up in the mountains and decided to look around a nearby lake for garter snakes. I didn't find anything and got ready to leave, but then spotted and pulled up a few old railroad ties. To my surprise, I found this very small snake. I'm almost 100% sure it's a young diamondback rattlesnake, but I've seen some very convincing gopher snakes around recently. The pupils tipped me off to this guy's ID.
[IMG]https://ball-pythons.net/forums/cach...%2F2cqiryf.jpg[/IMG]

Definitely not a rattlesnake. Seems to be a very interesting looking gopher snake. If you give the exact location and/or some more clearer pics, can probably offer more.

Ohhh, found that I could actually zoom in on that picture, haha. Night snake - Hypsiglena torquata.

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Originally Posted by John1982

Ohhh, found that I could actually zoom in on that picture, haha. Night snake - Hypsiglena torquata.

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Night snake in southern California? I was skeptical about it being a rattlesnake at first as well since I forgot to check for heat pits and just had the pictures to go off later on, but I asked a herper friend and he was adamant that it was one. :confusd: How can you tell it isn't a rattler?

Ah, I just looked up the night snake, looks like that's what I caught! Thank you for the help, guess I got ahead of myself. :rolleyes:

Wrong body shape, wrong head shape, wrong markings, no rattle(doesn't always mean anything but paired with the first 2, I think you can count it). Google image night snake, I think you'll find your culprit. You can also do a quick google search for a range map for the species, they have a huge range in the west.

As a word of advice, there is no trick to identifying venomous snakes other than learning the species themselves. Some venomous snakes dont have heat pits, some do. Some have slit pupils, some don't. Some are fat, some are skinny, they all have different scalation. Those informational 'guides' shouldn't be followed, as every species is very different :)

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Originally Posted by John1982

Wrong body shape, wrong head shape, wrong markings, no rattle(doesn't always mean anything but paired with the first 2, I think you can count it). Google image night snake, I think you'll find your culprit. You can also do a quick google search for a range map for the species, they have a huge range in the west.

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I see, the head shape also confused me, but I saw a couple pictures online that looked very similar to my little guy. I learn something new everyday. I didn't even think night snakes lived down in this area.

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Originally Posted by spazhime

As a word of advice, there is no trick to identifying venomous snakes other than learning the species themselves. Some venomous snakes dont have heat pits, some do. Some have slit pupils, some don't. Some are fat, some are skinny, they all have different scalation. Those informational 'guides' shouldn't be followed, as every species is very different :)

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Thanks, I kind of jumped right in to the rattlesnake conclusion...guess I need to get better at IDing and find a new friend to ask about herps...:)