How To Tell If A Snake Is Poisonous

How to Tell If a Snake is Poisonous

• Look at the pupil of his eye. The snakes that are not poisonous will have a round pupil.
• It has been seen that non-venomous snakes are of a single color only and will rarely have a combination of colors.
• The snakes that are poisonous usually have an elliptical pupil, like the eye of a cat, which gives the impression of a small slit in the middle of the eye. Except for the coral snakes, all other poisonous snakes in the world have slit eyes.
• If you see a snake that has stripes all the way, from head to tail, it will most probably be a non-poisonous snake.
• One very important way of determining if the snake is venomous or not, is by checking the shape of its head. The snakes that have a spoon-shaped round head are non-venomous, while those with a flat head are venomous. Watch out for snakes with triangle-shaped heads or arrow-heads as these are deadly snakes.
• A rattlesnake is the one that has a rattle on its tail and it is definitely poisonous. The rattle shake sounds are basically warning devices to drive away other creatures.
• A cottonmouth snake has a pointed snout and these are very poisonous.
• Poisonous snakes have a small depression between the eye and the nostril, known as a pit.
• Another way of finding out is by looking at the bottom of a snake’s tail. If the pattern of the lines on a snake’s tail area does not change, then the snake is poisonous.
• In case of water snakes, the ones that have most of the body floating over water are surely venomous.
• Coral snake is another beautiful but deadly snake. They look similar to the King snake which is non-venomous. Coral Snakes have a distinctive coloring, though, with a black, yellow and red bands, a yellow head, and a black band over their nose.
• Browse the internet and search about all the snakes in your area. This way, you will know all about the structure of all the poisonous ones and will be able to identify them easily.