This small rattlesnake is at home in both mesquite grasslands and pine-oak forests, where it lives in rocky outcrops or even old lava flows. But its original range has been drastically reduced. The open, grassy areas where the rattlesnakes occur are being cleared for farmland, since they are easier to convert than the nearby pine-oak forests. So the rattlesnake is now confined to smaller and smaller patches of land.

Did You Know?

This snake is venomous.