Campbell’s milk snake

Mimics the dangerous coral snake

Campbell’s milk snake is a snake that is completely harmless to humans. It has neither venom nor fangs, instead it squeezes its prey to death. But someone not familiar with it, human or animal, can confuse Campbell’s milk snake with another, far more dangerous snake. This is because Campbell’s milk snake resembles the very dangerous coral snake in colour and pattern. Mimicking a dangerous animal to trick predators into thinking you’re dangerous to eat is called mimicry.

Was believed to be milking cows at night

The milk snake gets its name from an old wives’ tale. The story tells that milk snakes used to enter barns at night to steal milk from cows. Of course, this is not true. What is more likely is that the snakes were attracted to farms because of the abundance of small rodents, which are fond of staying around farms.