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Lizards & Snakes
Lizards & Snakes · Squamata
Colubrid snakes
Family Colubridae
The largest snake family — mostly harmless, egg-laying and beginner-friendly. Home to the corn snake, kingsnakes, milk snakes, the theatrical hognose and the active garter snake.
7 species on Baskden · 7 with a full care guide.
- Bull Snake Pituophis catenifer sayi A big, bold North American colubrid — dramatic hissers that are mostly bluff, and impressive once settled.
- Corn Snake Pantherophis guttatus The forgiving, reliable-feeding first snake — hardy and endlessly bred in beautiful morphs.
- Rat Snake Pantherophis obsoletus A large, active climbing colubrid — hardy and rewarding, but a strong snake that gets well over a metre.
- California Kingsnake Lampropeltis californiae The hardy, glossy black-and-white beginner snake famous for one thing: it eats other snakes.
- Garter Snake Thamnophis sirtalis The active, diurnal little snake you actually see moving about — hardy and engaging, but fed on fish and worms rather than rodents.
- Milk Snake Lampropeltis triangulum The harmless coral-snake mimic — a kingsnake cousin whose bright bands bluff predators.
- Western Hognose Heterodon nasicus The small, upturned-nose drama queen — hoods like a cobra, plays dead, and is harmless doing it.