Description: This is a shiny, heavy bodied, 20 to 30 inch long, aquatic snake. Mud brown to olive brown dorsally with 4 stripes, 2 dorsolaterally and 2 laterally, that are variably discernable. There are 2 rows of dark crescents on the yellow to off-white venter. No dark lines on the sides of the yellow throat. Upper labials (lip) yellow. The 3 subspecies are very difficult to differentiate; use range. This subspecies may have only one preocular scale on one or both sides of the face.

Habitat: Habitats include slow waters of lowland areas, such as swamps, nontidal and tidal freshwater marshes, sphagnum bogs, pocosins, seepage wetlands, ponds, lakes, flatwoods ponds, cypress ponds, bayous, rice fields, canals, drainage ditches, mucky areas along streams, and floodplains; also sometimes grassy or wooded upland habitats adjacent to wetlands. Usually this snake is secluded in burrows (e.g., crayfish, muskrat), under mats of wet vegetation or debris at the water's edge, or among aquatic plants, but occasionally it basks on banks or on vegetation over water. It may travel on land during rain.

Range: USA (Louisiana); Type locality: Paradis, St. Charles Parish, Louisiana.

Found in these States: LA

Diet: Adults eat mainly crayfish, young eat small aquatic invertebrates such as dragonfly larvae; also fishes, frogs, and salamanders.

Reproduction: Gives birth to 6 to 16 young in summer.

Status: Listed as Least Concern in view of its wide distribution, tolerance of a degree of habitat modification, presumed large population, and because it is unlikely to be declining fast enough to qualify for listing in a more threatened category.

Taxonomy: