We spent a bit of time examining these plainbelly beauties.  The temperature being a bit on the chilly side, they were very cooperative, soaking up the warmth from our hands and arms and not shredding our appendages and digits as Nerodia are prone to do.  Are they true Copperbellies, or intergrades?  Jeff considered them to be true, and I'm going to agree.  I'm sold on the bright orange venter.

Close by this capture point Jim found a good-sized female Eastern Garter Snake (Thamnophis sirtalis sirtalis).  Our first and only garter snake of the trip. This snake was bleeding copiously from a small wound in the post-anal ventrals - did one of us step on its tail accidentally?  A little further we found a juvenile Eastern Ribbon Snake (Thamnophis sauritus sauritus).  The Eastern Ribbons lack the orange dorsal stripe and the large bright parietal spots that the Western Ribbons sport, but they are still a good looking snake!

Jim found another Copperbelly a bit further on, and this one was not so phlegmatic, chewing on him a bit.  Jeff got a turn too, finding another one a few feet further away.  Four water snakes in about fifty feet - not bad at all!

It was starting to sprinkle a bit, and it was now mid-afternoon.  Time for us to walk back and move on to one or two places before we lost the light or lost the dry, which ever came first.

Oh yeah, I was there too!