Black Rat Snake

Elaphe obsoleta obsoleta

What They Look Like

An adult Black Rat Snake is mostly black or dark brown with white on its chin and throat and may reach up to eight feet long, which makes it the longest snake in the Great Lakes Region.  A juvenile would be lighter in color and have a more visible pattern on its back. 

  

Where They Live

In Michigan Black Rat Snakes can mostly be found in the southern Lower Peninsula and are uncommon to rare throughout most of the Great Lakes.  They live in or near woodlands and also call shrubby fields, pastures, hedgerows, and marsh and bog edges home.

  

What They Eat

As its name implies the Black Rat Snake eats mostly mice and rats, but will also eat birds and bird eggs, frogs, reptiles and reptile eggs.  It will often hunt in and around barns, outbuildings, old foundations, trash dumps, abandoned cars, and farm machinery and truly are a farmers friend when it comes to pest control.  They kill their prey by constriction and swallow their prey whole.  The ligaments connecting their jawbones are elastic enabling them to expand their jaws to fit prey much larger than their head.

Things to Know

The Black Rat Snake is listed as a State Special Concern species meaning that if their numbers continue to decrease they may be reclassified as Threatened or even Endangered.  The population in southeastern Michigan has been greatly reduced.

Why We Have Them

MUCC got its Black Rat Snakes in March of 2004.  They were raised in captivity and because of that they cannot be returned to the wild.