A Guide to the Amphibians
and Reptiles of California

Western Black-headed Snake - Tantilla planiceps

(Blainville, 1835)

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Description • Taxonomy • Species Description • Scientific Name • Alt. Names • Similar Herps • References • Conservation Status

Red: Range in California

Click on the map for a topographical view

Map with California County Names

Adult, coastal Orange County © Ryan Sikola

Adult, coastal Orange County © Ryan Sikola

Adult, San Diego County

Adult, Alameda County

Adult, Imperial County.

Adult, Riverside County © Grigory Heaton

Adult, San Diego County with very faint white band on neck.

Adult, Alameda County. © Gary Nafis. Specimen courtesy of John Worden.

Adult, Imperial County

Adult, Riveside County © Brad Alexander

Adult, San Diego County © Dick Bartlett

Adult, coastal Orange County © Tadd Kraft

Adult, Ojai, Ventura County
© Michael Inaba

Adult, Alameda County © David Jahn

Adult, San Diego County
© Dan Kennedy

Adult, San Bernardino County © Jeff Teel

Adult, Orange County
© Mike Pecora

Adult, Alameda County © Mandy Colombo Murphy

Adult found near Brentwood, Los Angeles County © Madeline Hyman

Adult, San Luis Obispo County © Peter Gaede

Adult, Los Angeles County, found active on the surface during daylight on a summer evening.
© Trevor Yehle

Adult, Riverside County
© Brian Hinds

Adult, Alameda County © Mandy Colombo Murphy

This adult Black-headed Snake was found on a wet sidewalk in Thousand Oaks, Ventura County, after tropical storm Hilary. © Anonymous

Juveniles

Juvenile, Alameda County © Mark Gary

Habitat

Habitat, Imperial County desert

Habitat, grassland, Alameda County

Habitat, grassland, San Joaquin County

Habitat, grassland, Alameda County

Habitat, Riverside County hills

Habitat, San Diego County

San Diego County
coastal sage habitat

Short Videos

A Western Black-headed Snake discovered at night crawling in a sandy wash in Imperial County.

This little Tantilla was crawling at night in a sandy wash in the desert. It was filmed exactly it was found so it could crawl away in its known territory. The video starts out with the frightened reptile moving at escape velocity, and the camera has trouble keeping up with it before the snake slows down.

A tiny Western Black-headed Snake crawls around in San Diego County.

This snake was found in the early morning in a small pit trap set out to survey the reptiles, rodents, and other small animals that were crawling around in the coastal chapparal habitat. It was filmed with some difficulty where it was found and then was allowed to crawl away into the brush to find a place to hide until night fell when it would be more comfortable continuing its nocturnal foraging (and hopefully would not fall in the trap again.)

Description

Not Dangerous - This snake may produce a mild venom that does not typically cause death or serious illness or injury in most humans, but its bite should be avoided.

Commonly described as "harmless" or "not poisonous" to indicate that its bite is not dangerous, but "not venomous" is more accurate since the venom is not dangerous. (A poisonous snake can hurt you if you eat it. A venomous snake can hurt you if it bites you.)

Rear teeth on the upper jaw are enlarged and grooved to aid in injecting mild venom into prey.

Size

One of the smallest snakes in California, about 3.5 - 15.5 inches long (9 - 40 cm).

Appearance

A small, thin, snake with a flat head and smooth, shiny scales.

Color and Pattern

The body color is brownish or beige and unmarked.
The top of the head is dark brown or black, with a faint light collar between the dark cap and the body color.
This collar may or may not have a border of dark dots.
The dark color usually drops below the mouthline behind the corner of the jaw.
The belly is whitish with a reddish stripe that does not extend all the way to the edge of the ventral scales.

Similar Species

Comparison Chart of Tantilla hobartsmithi - Smith's Black-headed Snake and Tantilla planiceps - Western Black-headed Snake.

From Contra Costa County south to San Diego County Western Black-headed Snakes and Ring-necked Snakes might be found in the same location.
Both are small slender long-tailed snakes with a ring around the neck and red coloring on the belly.
Click the photo below to learn how to tell them apart easily.

Life History and Behavior

Activity

Secretive -spends much of its time underground or underneath surface objects.
A good burrower, able to disappear quickly into loose soil.
Occasionally found active on the surface at night on roads, especially after rains.

Diet and Feeding

Eats millipedes, centipedes, and insects.

Reproduction

Not well understood.
Females are oviparous, laying a clutch of 1-3 eggs is laid from May to June. (Stebbins, 2003)
This probably means that the young are hatched in late Summer.

Eggs have recently been found in a female collected on July 6th, "extending the period in which T. planiceps carries eggs from May into July."
(Goldberg. Herpetological Review 48(1), 2017)

Habitat

Occurs in grassland, chaparral, oak and oak-pine woodland, deserts. Along the rocky edges of streas and washes. Often found beneath rocks, plant debris, and other surface cover.

Geographical Range

The known range of this species in California and elsewhere is spotty due to its secretive nature. Its range is probably less disjointed than the records show.

It occurs along the coast of southern California, east and north to the desert side of the mountains as far as Whitewater Canon, and north through the south Coast Range to the San Francisco Bay where it has been recorded just south of San Jose, east of Mt. Diablo, and east of Livermore.
Documented in 2014 in the Caliente Mountains in San Luis Obispo County. (Herpetological Review 45(3), 2014)

Occurs in disjointed locations in Baja California, Mexico, south to the cape region.

Elevational Range

From near sea level to about 4,000 ft. (1,219 m).

Notes on Taxonomy

Alternate and Previous Names (Synonyms)

Tantilla planiceps - California Black-headed Snake (Stebbins & McGinnis 2012)
Tantilla planiceps - California Black-headed Snake (Western Black-headed Snake) (Stebbins 2003)
Tantilla planiceps - California Black-headed Snake (Stebbins 1985)
Tantilla planiceps eiseni - California Black-headed snake (Stebbins 1966)
Tantilla eiseni - California Black-headed snake (Stebbins 1954)
Tantilla eiseni transmontana - Desert black-headed snake (Klauber 1943)
Tantilla eiseni - California Tantilla (Tantilla nigriceps. Eisen's Black-headed Snake; Black-headed Tantilla) (Grinnell and Camp 1917)
Tantilla eiseni eiseni - California Tantilla (Stejneger 1896)
Eisen's black-head snake (Ditmars 1907)

California Black-headed snake
Black-headed tantilla

Conservation Issues (Conservation Status)

None

Taxonomy
Family	Colubridae	Colubrids	Oppel, 1811
Genus	Tantilla	Black-headed Snakes	Baird and Girard, 1853
Species	planiceps	Western Black-headed Snake	(Blainville, 1835)
Original Description
Tantilla planiceps - (Blainville, 1835) - Nouv. Ann. Mus. Hist. Nat. Paris, Vol. 4, p. 294, pl. 27, figs. 3-3b from Original Description Citations for the Reptiles and Amphibians of North America © Ellin Beltz
Meaning of the Scientific Name
Tantilla - Latin - tantillum - so small a thing - refers to the small size planiceps - Latin - planus flat and NL ceps head - refers to the flattened head from Scientific and Common Names of the Reptiles and Amphibians of North America - Explained © Ellin Beltz
Related or Similar California Snakes
T. hobartsmithi - Smith's Black-headed Snake H. t. nuchalata - California Nightsnake H. t. deserticola - Desert Nightsnake
More Information and References
California Department of Fish and Wildlife Stebbins, Robert C., and McGinnis, Samuel M. Field Guide to Amphibians and Reptiles of California: Revised Edition (California Natural History Guides) University of California Press, 2012. Stebbins, Robert C. California Amphibians and Reptiles. The University of California Press, 1972. Flaxington, William C. Amphibians and Reptiles of California: Field Observations, Distribution, and Natural History. Fieldnotes Press, Anaheim, California, 2021. Samuel M. McGinnis and Robert C. Stebbins. Peterson Field Guide to Western Reptiles & Amphibians. 4th Edition. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company, 2018. Stebbins, Robert C. A Field Guide to Western Reptiles and Amphibians. 3rd Edition. Houghton Mifflin Company, 2003. Behler, John L., and F. Wayne King. The Audubon Society Field Guide to North American Reptiles and Amphibians. Alfred A. Knopf, 1992. Powell, Robert., Joseph T. Collins, and Errol D. Hooper Jr. A Key to Amphibians and Reptiles of the Continental United States and Canada. The University Press of Kansas, 1998. Bartlett, R. D. & Patricia P. Bartlett. Guide and Reference to the Snakes of Western North America (North of Mexico) and Hawaii. University Press of Florida, 2009. Bartlett, R. D. & Alan Tennant. Snakes of North America - Western Region. Gulf Publishing Co., 2000. Brown, Philip R. A Field Guide to Snakes of California. Gulf Publishing Co., 1997. Ernst, Carl H., Evelyn M. Ernst, & Robert M. Corker. Snakes of the United States and Canada. Smithsonian Institution Press, 2003. Wright, Albert Hazen & Anna Allen Wright. Handbook of Snakes of the United States and Canada. Cornell University Press, 1957. Joseph Grinnell and Charles Lewis Camp. A Distributional List of the Amphibians and Reptiles of California. University of California Publications in Zoology Vol. 17, No. 10, pp. 127-208. July 11, 1917.

Conservation Status
The following conservation status listings for this animal are taken from the January 2024 State of California Special Animals List and the January 2024 Federally Listed Endangered and Threatened Animals of California list (unless indicated otherwise below.) Both lists are produced by multiple agencies every year, and sometimes more than once per year, so the conservation status listing information found below might not be from the most recent lists. To make sure you are seeing the most recent listings, go to this California Department of Fish and Wildlife web page where you can search for and download both lists: https://www.wildlife.ca.gov/Data/CNDDB/Plants-and-Animals. A detailed explanation of the meaning of the status listing symbols can be found at the beginning of the two lists. For quick reference, I have included them on my Special Status Information page. If no status is listed here, the animal is not included on either list. This most likely indicates that there are no serious conservation concerns for the animal. To find out more about an animal's status you can also go to the NatureServe and IUCN websites to check their rankings. This snake is not included on the Special Animals List, which indicates that there are no significant conservation concerns for it in California.
Organization	Status Listing	Notes
NatureServe Global Ranking
NatureServe State Ranking
U.S. Endangered Species Act (ESA)	None
California Endangered Species Act (CESA)	None
California Department of Fish and Wildlife	None
Bureau of Land Management	None
USDA Forest Service	None
IUCN

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