SNAKE FAECES (POOPS)

Snake Poop Photograph

Many people ask me - what does snake poop look like? The answer is that it's pretty hard to identify. Snakes are carnivores. They eat only meat, but specifically, they eat whole animals. Small snakes eat insects, then as snakes get a bit bigger, maybe small frogs, other snakes etc. and then larger snakes eat mammals. Mice and rats are common, but large snakes can eat big mammals, whole of course. The feces of carnivores tend to be somewhat mushy, because there's not a whole lot of plant fiber. This is also the case with snakes. Snake feces are usually pretty mushy, and smooth. Some snake poo does contain fur, of course, since they eat mammals, but still, the consistency is generally a bit mushy with smooth edges.

Also, snakes basically poop and pee at the same time out of one hole, the cloacae, so that also makes things a bit runny. Oftentimes snake poo has a white cap, or white stuff smeared throughout it. This is called a urea cap, or urea smear. You might think that snake droppings would be long and thin, since snakes are long and thin. However, this isn't the case - they are fatter than you might imagine.  When fresh, the snake poop is usually dark brown, but as it dries out, it turns more chalky in color. The bottom line is that it is fairly difficult to identify, in my opinion, at least if you don't already know what the droppings of other animals look like, which would allow you to rule out other critters. I know what the feces of over three hundred and forty different animals look like, so I could rule out a lot of the usual suspects first. For example, a lot of animals leave pellet turds - little round or oval balls. Snakes don't do this. They pass their waste fairly infrequently, just as they eat fairly infrequently. When they do go, it's a large, relatively thick, slimy mess.