Description: Adults of this species measure 18 to 55 inches in length, but the average size is under 36 inches. A medium-sized snake with a head barely wider than the neck and keeled dorsal scales. The eyes are relatively larged compared with other gartersnake species. The ground color is dark gray, black or brown. The dorsal stripe is wide and yellowish, and there is a yellowish stripe along the bottom of each side. The red on the sides of this Common Gartersnake are usually confined to the area just above the lateral stripes, in a single row, alternating with dark markings. The top of the head is dark; black, dark gray, or brownish. There is sometimes a bit of red on the sides of the head. The underside is bluish gray, and it may become darker toward the tail, or may become paler.

Habitat: Utilizes a wide variety of habitats - forests, mixed woodlands, grassland, chaparral, farmlands, often near ponds, marshes, or streams.

Range: This wide-ranging subspecies is found throughout all of northern California, including the coast in Humboldt and Del Norte Counties, south, east of the north and south coast ranges through the Great Valley and much of the Sierra Nevada (excluding a large part of the interior part of the San Joaquin Valley alley) and east of the Sierra Nevada into the northern part of the Owens Valley Outside of California. T. s. fitchiM ranges north all the way to extreme southern Alaska, and east into western Nevada, Idaho, western Montana, western Wyoming, and northcentral Utah.

Found in these States: CA | ID | MT | NV | OR | UT | WA | WY

Diet: Eats a wide variety of prey, including amphibians and their larvae, fish, birds, and their eggs, small mammals, reptiles, earthworms, slugs, and leeches.

Reproduction: Females are ovoviviparous - they carry the eggs internally until the young are born live.

Status: Listed as Least Concern in view of its extremely wide distribution, presumed large population, and because populations are unlikely to be declining.

Taxonomy: