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Definition of Chicken snake
1. Noun. Large North American snake.
Definition of Chicken snake
1. The chicken snake is not actually a real species of snake, it is a colloquial term given to a number of different snakes which often frequent farms and barns, usually looking for rodent prey, but sometimes will also consume chicken eggs and young chicks. The species which the term "chicken snake" refers to varies by geographic location, but typically it is the rat snakes, of the genus Pantherophis which are labelled as such. In Texas it is usually the Texas rat snake (Pantherophis obsoletus lindheimeri), in the southeast it is often the black rat snake (Pantherophis obsoletus obsoletus), in the Midwestern United States it is the fox snake (Pantherophis vulpina or Pantherophis gloydi), and in Central and South America it is the tiger rat snake (Spilotes pullatus). Almost any other snake that isn't considered to be a rattlesnake or cottonmouth on a farm property is often referred to as a "chicken snake".
Lexicographical Neighbors of Chicken Snake
Literary usage of Chicken snake
Below you will find example usage of this term as found in modern and/or classical literature:
1. The Reptile Book: A Comprehensive, Popularised Work on the Structure and by Raymond Lee Ditmars (1907)
"Bold, and comparatively fearless as compared with most serpents, the Chicken
Snake will frequently move lazily away if surprised, or if cornered, ..."
2. History of Vermont: Natural, Civil and Statistical, in Three Parts, with an by Zadock Thompson (1853)
"THE chicken snake. Coluber eximius.—DE KAT. HISTORY. ... It is called the Chicken
Snake on account of its occasionally destroying young chickens. ..."
3. With Sabre and Scalpel: The Autobiography of a Soldier and Surgeon by John Allan Wyeth (1914)
"... The blacksnake and the chicken-snake, constrictors of near kin to the racer
and the coach-whip, but not nearly so swift, are tree-climbers. ..."
4. Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington by Biological Society of Washington (1882)
"... Georgia; and Orlando, Florida. Coluber obsoletas confinis. SPOTTED chicken snake.
... chicken snake. ..."
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