Title: The American Museum journal
Identifier: americanmuseumjo16amer (find matches)
Year: c1900-(1918) (c190s)
Authors: American Museum of Natural History
Subjects: Natural history
Publisher: New York : American Museum of Natural History
Contributing Library: American Museum of Natural History Library
Digitizing Sponsor: Biodiversity Heritage Library

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184 THE AMERICAN MUSEUM .JOURNAL striking distance. When a rattler or copper- head does strike however, it sometimes not only makes a simple strike with its fangs but also grips its jaws together and tries to wrestle its fangs deeper into the object struck so as to cause a better mjection of its venom. On one of my trips to the Wallkill-Hamburg Mountains of New Jersey while I was stand- ing at the edge of the top of a small cliff about forty feet high, I discovered two rattlers, male and female, lying near each other at the bottom. By retracing my steps about eighty yards, I was able to work a way to the foot of the cliff, then after fixing up the snake bag in nearby bushes, I advanced to where the rattlers were, meanwhile lightly beating the low berry bushes ahead of me with my stick so that I might not accidentally step on any hidden snakes. When I came up to the two snakes the yellow-phased one (female) slowly crawled away directly to the rear of the black one (male, supposedly), which went into a coil, head toward me and waited. Neither snake rattled although I was then standing within four or five feet of them,- and had beaten the bushes close to
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Pilot or riiounluiii hiack snake (Coliiltcr ohsolelns) and Iho more abuiidaiil common black snake or racer (Ras- caiiion constriclor). The pilot, can be distinguished from the racer by its broad head, keeled scales and white spots on the margin of the scales as well as by its slow movement, its good nature and its great power as a constrictor The pilot is, next to the indigo and pine snakes, the largest harmless snake in the United States

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