Description: R. grahamii is a medium-sized snake, measuring an average of 18 to 28 inches in total length (including tail), but can grow up to almost 4 feet long in some cases. The maximum recorded total length is 47 inches. It is usually a brown or gray color with an occasional faint mid-dorsal stripe. Its lateral stripes are typically cream, white tan, or light yellow and located from the belly up to the fourth scale row. The belly is typically the same color as the lateral stripes and is unmarked, with the exception of a row of dark dots down the center (rare in specimens).

Habitat: This snake inhabits sluggish streams, river-bottom sloughs, bayous, pond and lake margins, marshes, swamps, rice fields, and roadside ditches, often in water-edge vegetation, under shore debris, or in crayfish burrows.

Range: This species is endemic to the United States. Its range extends from eastern Nebraska, Iowa, and Illinois south to the Gulf Coast of Texas and Louisiana.

Found in these States: AR | IA | IL | KS | LA | MO | MS | NE | OK | TX

Diet: Graham's crayfish snake feeds chiefly upon crayfish, especially recently molted crayfish. It is also reported to eat fish and amphibians.

Reproduction: Adult females of R. grahamii bear live young in broods of 10 to 15. Each newborn is about 8 inches in total length (including tail).

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: