There have been three Water-Moccasins killed on my place in the last eight days. Two of them were of the "Cottonmouth" variety. One of the three had a black mouth. Are there different species of Water-Moccasins or are there just some "Cottonmouths" that don't have a white mouth? The black mouthed one was almost three feet long and bigger than one of the others that had a white mouth so it wasn't a juvenile.

EDIT: I Should have told the whole story in my first post. Its a little lengthy but here goes. I was on a tractor working a stump pile and my neighbors dog was in the pile trying to catch field mice she had seen. I had been working the pile for a few minutes when the snake crawled out of the pile revealing itself. I was trying to get my tractor bucket on the snake when the dog saw it. Do you know a dog can be as hard headed as woman sometimes? Here I am hollering at the dog while trying to kill the snake when the inevitable happened. The dog bobbed when it should have weaved and got snake bit. I finally got the snake killed, saw the black mouth and for a moment thought that maybe this is a banded water snake. I checked the snake for fangs and my heart sank when I found them. I told my neighbor what had happened and around two hours later the right side of the dog's face was extremely swollen and she was a drooling badly. So there is no doubt it was a Water-Moccasin. It was not a Copperhead or a Rattler without rattles. My neighbor said the dog was still swollen this morning, lethargic but was wagging her tail. I pray she will be alright.

UPDATE: Saw the snake bit dog this evening. She ran wide open a good 200 yards tail wagging and excited to see us. The swelling in her face had gone down and looked near normal. She still had a lot of swelling in her neck but she is going to be fine. Seeing the snake strike and connect is something I won't soon forget. I do have to be better prepared to deal with situations like this as I'm in the process of clearing overgrown acreage that has ponds and I know this is not the last encounter I'll have with these belly crawling demons.

This is flat out racist. I'm offended!

I was always under the interpretation that Cottonmouth/Water Moccasin were interchangeable terms because they ALL had white mouths...

you sure the one with a black mouth wasn't a water snake? they can look very similar and man non-venomous snakes can make their head look flat/pointed like a venomous one when threatened...

Water moccasin is a cottonmouth. It was most likely a water snake of some sort, non-venomous.

Cottonmouth and moccasin are the same thing. Most people ain't got a clue what they are looking at, when it comes to snakes. My mom told me she killed a big Ol moccasin one day, I went down by the pond to get rid of it, and it was a dang rat snake

The dreaded Copperheaded Waterrattler....

Snake lives matter....

Sounds like three good snakes.

This, for sure. Saw recently where someone had killed a 6-foot copperhead. WTH? Six feet?

6 feet ain't nothing, I've heard of an 8 footer

I have trouble with the banded water snake versus moccasin at times. Killed a big moccasin last year and almost didn't kill it thinking it was a water snake.

Could you imagine? That thing would be as big as a dang basketball in the middle!

X2. I think it was James that posted a pic of a water snake in camp with them and everything about that snake looked like a moccasin except for its head. I normally don't get that close of a look before I've found a stick and get to whackin!

If it don't have a white mouth it is not a cottonmouth. Water moccasin is an interchangeable term. Like has already been posted 95 people out of 100 couldn't tell the difference in a venomous and non venomous snake. I teach snake ID courses and it's a sad fact.

What gets me is a juvy moccasin and a copperhead. Hard for me to tell them apart.

to be on the safe side i just kill em all

Who cares if it is venomous or not once it is big and intimidating it is time for it to be dead. Glad your place is 3 shy of where it started original poster!

Shoot first, identify later

When in doubt take em' out.

I think all cottonmouths have a white mouth. I've seen so many people identify a snake as a "water moccasin" only to find out that it was a type of water snake.

Here's what I look for to determine if it is one of the 3 pit vipers found in America (rattlesnake, water moccasin/cottonmouth, and copperhead). All have pits between their eyes and nostrils, have diamond shaped eyes(cat eyes), and have single rows (as opposed to a split row)of scales between the anal vent and the tip of their tails.

When you check these things, they will have all 3, so you can identify it as poisonous with 100% accuracy.

You can even find a shed snake skin and determine if it was poisonous or not if you have the scale pattern below the anal vent. Non-poisonous ones split into 2 rows while poisonous ones remain a single row, and look the same as above the vent. Of course this also works for a snake that has it's head smashed or removed.