re: Canebreak Rattler - New Orleans

He probably found it in a burned up car

Plenty of snakes in that city. Most of them have shoulders, some even inhabit City Hall.

If Dumas was really the Mack Daddy of rattle snakedom in LA he would stick closer to home and go catch an uber rare diamondback......

rare or virtually non existent in LA.....

I know I'll get blasted for this, but I always thought canebrake and timber were two different snakes. Google says they are the same. I've killed a couple 3 footers that we called canebrakes, and have only seen one big one run over with a bush hog that the guy said was a timber rattler. It was 5 feet long and bigger than my arm. Looked a lot darker, but that could be a maturity/color phase thing I guess.

Learnt something new already this morning.

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but I always thought canebrake and timber were two different snakes

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"Canebrakes" used to be a recognized subspecies of Timber rattlesnakes. But, I think biologists decided they don't warrant their own subspecies. There is quite a bit of color variation among timber rattlesnakes, even in the same region. They can be anything from a very light gold, to almost black.

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If Dumas was really the Mack Daddy of rattle snakedom in LA he would stick closer to home and go catch an uber rare diamondback...... rare or virtually non existent in LA.....


I've never understood this. If I put in a day in turkey woods in Hancock, Harrison, or Pearl River county I'd almost expect to see one. But years of hunting st. tammany, Tangipahoa, and Washington parish and nothing.

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From what I understand they historically only inhabited 3 areas in LA

1 near where Lake Ramsey is.
2 an area near franklinton
3. an area near folsom

I spent a great deal of time "searching in two of those areas as a volunteer back in the summer of 85 - we found many canebreaks, a few pigmys and of course copperheads and mocasins -


and there were very very few of them even at the peak of the habitat suitability. which if I am not mistaken was the western most edge of their range...


and yep I encountered 2 3" eastern's near silver run Ms fairly easily.... a few years back....

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rare diamondback......

rare or virtually non existent in LA.....


yep. i'm lucky enough to have seen one in tunica hills - big sob also. i let him go on by

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really? when

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I know I'll get blasted for this, but I always thought canebrake and timber were two different snakes.

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No one should blast:

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The subspecies C. h. atricaudatus (Latreille in Sonnini and Latreille, 1802), often referred to as the canebrake rattlesnake,[3] is currently considered invalid.[34] Previously, it was recognized by Gloyd (1936) and Klauber (1936). Based on an analysis of geographic variation, Pisani et al. (1972) concluded no subspecies should be recognized. This was rejected by Conant (1975), but followed by Collins and Knight (1980). Brown and Ernst (1986) found evidence for retaining the two subspecies, but state it is not possible to tell them apart without having more information than usual, including adult size, color pattern, the number of dorsal scale rows and the number of ventral scales. Dundee and Rossman (1989) recognized C. h. atricaudatus, but others take a more neutral point of view.

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This looks like what I've killed and called a canebrake. The orange stripe down the back is what sticks out to me. It's a pretty snake.



Timber rattler... Dark and heavy bodied.