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Sub-adult, San Diego County | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Sub-adult, San Diego County | Adult, Santa Barbara County © Brian Hubbs |
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Sub-adult, San Diego County | Sub-adult in defensive pose, San Diego County. This snake has flattened its head into a triangular shape to mimic a venomous snake to scare me away. | Adult, Santa Barbara County © Ryan Sikola |
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Adult, preparing to shed, coastal San Diego County | Adult, San Diego County © Taylor Henry | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Adult, Laguna Mountains, San Diego County © John Stoklosa |
Adult, Ventura County © Jeremy Huff |
Sub-adults, two color phases, Ventura County. © Brian Hubbs |
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Adult, Santa Barbara County © Jason Butler |
An adult snake with a reddish stripe from just west of the Piru River in Ventura County. © Vince Semonsen | Adult, San Bernardino County © Jeff Ahrens | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Adult from the Mohave Desert at Victorville, San Bernardino County © Michael Clarkson |
Adult, Ventura County © Patrick Briggs |
Adult, preparing to shed, with milky eyes, San Diego County |
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Adult in creek, Orange County © Jeff Ahrens |
Adult in creek, Orange County © Jeff Ahrens |
Adult swimming in a flooded meadow in in the San Diego County mountains © Cherie Trivizo |
Adult, Riverside County © Jeff Ahrens |
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Adult in creek, San Bernardino County © Jeff Ahrens | Adult in an Orange County creek © Robert Hamilton | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Adults, Santa Ana Mountains, Orange County © Tadd Kraft |
Adult, San Diego County © Paul Maier |
The Two-striped Gartersnake typically has a single light stripe low on each side of the body but lacks the light stripe on top of the back which is present in most other gartersnakes found in California. | Sign, San Diego County park | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Central Coast Dark Morph Two-striped Gartersnakes, and Others with Aberrant Pigmentation or Unusual Patterns | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Melanistic adult, San Luis Obispo County © Katie Drexhage | Very dark adult, Monterey County © Harry Moffett | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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A very dark adult from the San Gabriel Mountains in San Bernardino County © Kyle Watson This snake has defensively flattened its head into a triangular shape to make it appear to be venomous. | Melanistic adult, San Luis Obispo County © Ryan Sikola | An atypical spotted morph adult from Los Angeles County © Chris DeGroof | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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This unusually-pigmented spotted morph Two-striped Gartersnake was found in Riverside County. It's not an albino, because the eyes are dark, but it is missing some of its normal dark pigment. © ELMT Consulting, Inc. Travis J. McGill This snake has defensively flattened its head into a triangular shape to make it appear to be venomous. |
This melanistic adult Two-striped Gartersnake was observed in San Luis Obispo County. © Ryan Sikola | Juvenile, San Luis Obispo County. Juvenile melanistic snakes in this area start out lighter in color with a light belly then get darker with age. © Ryan Sikola |
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Hybrids | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Adult, Santa Barbara County © Ryan Sikola |
Adult, San Luis Obispo County © Ryan Sikola |
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These snake are unusual hybrids of the Two-striped Gartersnake and the Diablo Range Gartersnake, Thamnopis atratus zaxanthus. Note the thin yellow vertebral stripe that is not present on T. hammondii and is much thinner than that found on T. atratus. T. atratus is so scarce at the edge of its range in San Luis Obispo and Santa Barbara counties that they breed with T. hammondii which is more abundant in the area. |
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Two-striped Gartersnakes Feeding and Predation | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Steve Ivie and his Cub Scout troupe saw this gartersnake enter a river in the San Gabriel Mountains of Los Angeles County. They watched the snake swim upstream and grab a trout about 8 or 9 inches in length, then drag the trout onto a rock at the edge of the river, and eat it, as you can see above. © Steve Ivie |
Adult eating a sucker on a rock next to the San Gabriel River, Los Angeles County. © Seth Coffman | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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This juvenile snake is eating a Baja California Treefrog tadpole in the Santa Monica Mountains of Los Angeles County. © NPS |
This juvenile snake is eating a young California Treefrog in the Santa Monica Mountains of Los Angeles County. © NPS | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Adult spotted morph T. hammondii eating a trout pulled from a pool in a Monterey County creek that dried up during the summer of 2014 due to the drought. © Pete Veilleux |
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This dead Two-striped Gartersnake was found in San Diego County inside the belly of an American Bullfrog along with an Arroyo Toad which was alive. When put back in the creek, the toad hopped away. © Andrew Borcher Animals captured and handled under authorization by the Califoirnia Department of Fish and Wildlife. |
This adult Two-striped Gartersnake was observed eating a California Toad in San Diego County. It took the snake almost 45 minutes to completely swallow the toad, which had puffed its body up to make itself harder to swallow. You can also watch a YouTube video of the event:Two Striped Garter Feeds on a California Toad © Douglas S. Brown |
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Habitat | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Habitat, coastal sage, San Diego County |
Habitat, desert creek, San Diego County |
Habitat, flooded meadow in Spring, San Diego County mountains © Cherie Trivizo |
Habitat, San Diego County mountain meadow |
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Habitat, coastal stream, San Diego County |
Habitat, San Gabriel Mountains, Los Angeles County |
Habitat, creek, 5,200 ft., San Gabriel Mountains, Los Angeles County |
Habitat, small creek, Orange County © Jeff Ahrens |
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Habitat, lake edge, 4,600 ft. San Diego County |
Habitat, mountain creek, San Diego County |
Habitat, seasonal pond, San Diego County |
Riparian habitat, Ventura County. © Brian Hubbs |
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Habitat, small creek, San Diego County |
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A Two-striped Gartersnake filmed in San Diego County. |
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Conservation Status | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
The following conservation status listings for this animal are taken from the November 2020 California "Special Animals List" and the November 2020 "State and Federally Listed Endangered and Threatened Animals of California" list, both of which are produced by multiple agencies and available here: https://www.wildlife.ca.gov/Data/CNDDB/Plants-and-Animals. You can check the link to see if there are more recent lists. If no status is listed here, the animal is not included on either list. This most likely indicates that there are no serious conservation concerns for the animal. To find out more about an animal's status you can go to the NatureServe and IUCN websites to check their rankings. The 2019 Special Animals List lists the population on Santa Catalina Island as a separate subspecies, Thamnophis hammondii pop. 1. - Santa Catalina gartersnake. This listing for this snake is shown below the listings for the other populations of T. hammondii. This is the listing for Thamnophis hammondii - two-striped gartersnake: |
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Organization | Status Listing | Notes | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
NatureServe Global Ranking | G4 | Apparently Secure—Uncommon but not rare; some cause for long-term concern due to declines or other factors. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
NatureServe State Ranking | S3S4 |
Vulnerable—Vulnerable in the state due to a restricted range, relatively few populations (often 80 or fewer), recent and widespread declines, or other factors making it vulnerable to extirpation from the state. |
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U.S. Endangered Species Act (ESA) | None | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
California Endangered Species Act (CESA) | None | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
California Department of Fish and Wildlife | SSC | Species of Special Concern | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Bureau of Land Management | S | Sensitive | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
USDA Forest Service | S | Sensitive | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
IUCN | LC | Least Concern | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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