Range in California: Blue
Click the map for a guide
to the other subspecies
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Adult, Spring Valley, San Diego County |
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Adult, Spring Valley,
San Diego County |
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| Ring-necked Snakes use a mild venom to subdue their prey which include snakes and lizards. This snake from San Diego County regurgitated a California Legless Lizard that it had recently eaten. © Donald Schultz |
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Habitat, San Diego County |
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Habitat, coastal chaparral, San Diego County
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Coastal San Diego County grassland habitat that is rapidly disappearing due to development. © Brian Hinds |
Habitat, mountain meadow, San Diego County |
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Description |
Mildly Venomous |
| Not considered dangerous to humans. Enlarged non-grooved teeth in the rear of the upper jaw and mild venom which may help to incapacitate small prey. |
| Size |
| 8 - 34 inches long (20 - 87cm.) Most snakes of this subspecies are adult at about 11 - 16 inches (28 - 41 cm.) |
| Appearance |
| A small, thin snake with smooth scales. Gray, blue-gray, blackish, or dark olive dorsal coloring, with a yellowish or light orange underside that is lightly speckled with black markings. The underside of the tail is a bright reddish orange. An orange band around the neck 1.5 - 3 scales wide. |
| Behavior |
Secretive - usually found under the cover of rocks, wood, bark, boards and other surface debris, but occasionally seen moving on the surface on cloudy days, at dusk, or at night.
When disturbed, coils its tail like a corkscrew, exposing the underside which is usually bright red. It may also smear musk and cloacal contents. |
| Diet |
| Eats small salamanders, tadpoles, small frogs, small snakes, lizards, worms, slugs, and insects. The mild venom may help to incapacitate prey. |
| Reproduction |
| Lays eggs in the summer, sometimes in a communal nest. |
| Range |
| Found mainly in San Diego County along the coast and into the Peninsular range, and southwestern San Bernardino County. Ranges south barely into northern Baja California. |
| Habitat |
| Prefers moist habitats, including wet meadows, rocky hillsides, gardens, farmland, grassland, chaparral, mixed coniferous forests, woodlands. |
| Taxonomic Notes |
Many herpetologists no longer recognize the traditional morphologically-based subspecies of Diadophis punctatus, pending a thorough molecular study of the whole species. One ongoing study (Feldman and Spicer, 2006, Mol. Ecol. 15:2201-2222) has found all of the D. punctatus subspecies in California (except D. p. regalis) to be indistinguishable. It is likely that D. punctatus is composed of several distinct lineages that do not follow the geographic ranges of the subspecies.
In a phylogeographic analysis of the species, Fontanella, et. al identified fourteen lineages of Diadophis punctatus. They did not recognize these lineages as separate species, pending a full taxonomic review that will require further dna sampling and evaluation, including populations in Mexico.
In our area, they recognized four distinct lineages, which loosely follow existing subspecies boundaries, but merge the seven subspecies into 4 groups:
* A southern California lineage, which includes the San Diego and San Bernardino subspecies, D. p. similis, and D. p. modestus
* An eastern California lineage, which includes the Coral-bellied subspecies, D. p. pulchellus, and some of the northern intergrades with D. p. occidentalis.
* A Coastal California lineage, which includes the Monterey subspecies, D. p. vandenburghi, the Pacific subspcies, D. p. amabilis, the Northwestern subspecies, D. p. occidentalis, and snakes from one region of the western Sierra Nevada currently recognized as D. p. pulchellus, along with the southern intergrades in the Tehachapi mountains region.
* A Great Basin lineage which presumably includes the Regal subspecies, D. p. regalis, found in isolated locations in the eastern Mojave.
A rough interpretation of the ranges of these four lineages is illustrated in the map below. |
Green: Southern lineage
Orange: Eastern lineage
Blue: Coastal lineage
Light Blue: Great Basin lineage
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| Conservation Issues (Conservation Status) |
| On the US Forest Service's watch list of sensitive species. This is most likely due to the loss of so much natural habitat in coastal San Diego County. |
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Taxonomy |
| Family |
Colubridae |
Colubrids |
| Genus |
Diadophis |
Ring-necked Snakes |
| Species |
punctatus |
Ring-necked Snake |
Subspecies
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similis |
San Diego Ring-necked Snake |
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Original Description |
Diadophis punctatus - (Linnaeus, 1766) - Syst. Nat., 12th ed., Vol. 1, p. 376
Diadophis punctatus similis - Blanchard, 1923 - Occ. Papers Mus. Zool. Univ. Michigan, No. 142, p. 4
from Original Description Citations for the Reptiles and Amphibians of North America © Ellin Beltz
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Meaning of the Scientific Name |
Diadophis - Latin - diadema - crown and Greek -ophis - snake -- "generally w/a light ring on the occipital region."
punctatus - Latin - dotted - refers to spotted belly of species
similis - Latin - like or similar to - possibly referring to its similarity to other ringneck snakes
from Scientific and Common Names of the Reptiles and Amphibians of North America - Explained © Ellin Beltz
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Alternate Names |
Diadophis punctatus - Ring-necked Snake (no subspecies recognized)
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Related or Similar California Snakes |
D. p. amabilis - Pacific Ring-necked Snake
D. p. modestus - San Bernardino Ring-necked Snake
D. p. occidentalis - Northwestern Ring-necked Snake
D. p. pulchellus - Coral-bellied Ring-necked Snake
D. p. regalis - Regal Ring-necked Snake
D. p. vandenburgii - Monterey Ring-necked Snake
T. planiceps - Western Black-headed Snake
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More Information and References |
Natureserve Explorer
California Dept. of Fish and Game
Stebbins, Robert C. A Field Guide to Western Reptiles and Amphibians. 3rd Edition. Houghton Mifflin Company, 2003.
Behler, John L., & F. Wayne King. The Audubon Society Field Guide to North American Reptiles and Amphibians. Alfred A. Knopf, 1992.
Bartlett, R.D. , & Alan Tennant. Snakes of North America - Western Region. Gulf Publishing Co., 2000.
Ernst, Carl H., Evelyn M. Ernst, & Robert M. Corker. Snakes of the United States and Canada. Smithsonian Institution Press, 2003.
Wright, Albert Hazen & Anna Allen Wright. Handbook of Snakes of the United States and Canada. Cornell University Press.
Brown, Philip R. A Field Guide to Snakes of California. Gulf Publishing Co., 1997.
Fontanella , Frank M., Chris R. Feldman, Mark E. Siddall, & Frank T. Burbrink. Phylogeography of Diadophis punctatus: Extensive lineage diversity and repeated patterns of historical demography in a trans-continental snake. Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 46 (2008) 1049–1070. 2008.
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The following status listings come from the Special Animals List which is published several times each year by the California Department of Fish and Game.
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Organization
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Status Listing
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| U.S. Endangered Species Act (ESA) |
None |
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| California Endangered Species Act (CESA) |
None |
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| California Department of Fish and Game |
None |
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| Bureau of Land Management |
None |
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| USDA Forest Service |
USFS:S |
Sensitive |
| Natureserve Global Conservation Status Ranks |
G5 |
Secure |
World Conservation Union - IUCN Red List
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None |
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