Eastern Worm Snake (Carphophis amoenus)
Dead individual found (injured by another animal) on a dirt road at a dense mixed forest edge (a seasonal stream nearby). It was being eaten by ants, so I relocated it for photographs.
This species is very strange as it is almost entirely fossorial, burrowing underground and hunting earthworms (and other soft-bodied prey). When attacked by predators, it uses its sharp-tipped tail as a defense. It is a protected species in Georgia (and threatened/imperiled in several other states).
"Carphophis amoenus", commonly known as the worm snake, is a species of nonvenomous colubrid endemic to the eastern United States. "C. amoenus" can be found east of the Mississippi, from southwest Massachusetts south to southern Alabama west to Louisiana and then north to Illinois.
