![\"eastern](\"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/GlassLiz1.jpg\")
The stocky body with abrupt tail, and the lack of a demarcation of the neck, clued me in, and my go-to herp site<\/a> confirmed the precise species. This is an eastern glass lizard (Ophisaurus ventralis<\/em>,) occasionally called a glass snake, but it’s one of the various species of legless lizards. You may say, “Well, that pretty much defines a snake, doesn’t it?” but that’s not exactly true – don’t assume it’s Order. There are a few distinct differences, some of which I can illustrate, and some I can’t.<\/p>\n
But first, a little bit of a scale shot.<\/p>\n
This is the part that surprised me, however – I just assumed it was more snakelike:<\/strong><\/p>\n They get their name from a common habit when captured, which is to drop their tail to distract their attacker (so they ‘break’ like glass) – this of course writhes vigorously, the motion attracting attention to allow the lizard to escape. And this one displayed its own evidence of this from the past.<\/p>\n Still hoping to get pics of a wild cottonmouth, but I won’t be handling that one if and when I come across it…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Looked out the garage window at the driveway yesterday afternoon and saw an odd shape that, as I watched, moved a little. I immediately hit the button to open the overhead door and scampered out to snag it, confirming my suspicions as I did so. With the exception of a glimpse of one out on […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,3],"tags":[8681,8677,8680,8679,8678,8682,8683],"class_list":["post-41629","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-nature","category-photo","tag-dropped-tail","tag-eastern-glass-lizard","tag-glass-snake","tag-legless-lizard","tag-ophisaurus-ventralis","tag-regrowth","tag-thats-not-a-snake"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41629","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41629"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41629\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":41638,"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41629\/revisions\/41638"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41629"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41629"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41629"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"eastern](\"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/GlassLiz3.jpg\")
The Girlfriend’s distaste of snakes extend to glass lizards, and she probably wouldn’t handle any given lizard for photographs simply from the fear of injuring them, so it’s generally up to me, until I hire a wrangler with all the ad proceeds from this site. Notice the general shape of the head, and the thickness behind it, and the fact that the eyes are aiming downwards here. Snakes have fixed eyes and no eyelids, while glass lizards (all lizards) have movable eyes that they can close, though this one was disinclined to wink at me. There’s also the lack of the small gap at the front of the mouth to extend the tongue, since only snakes sample the air with them;<\/strong> I got a glimpse of this one’s tongue, very dark and not long or forked like a snake’s, yet never offered for view while the camera was ready.<\/p>\n![\"eastern](\"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/GlassLizEar.jpg\")
Lizards also have ears while snakes don’t;<\/strong> this is barely visible as a small horizontal slit\/dent a little ways back from the mouth. And that side pattern is groovy.<\/p>\n![\"eastern](\"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/GlassLizCloaca.jpg\")
Down at the right edge of my hand you’ll see something that looks like a scar on the underside of the lizard. This is the vent or cloaca, and with snakes it’s roughly 3\/4 of the way along their body length, but for these guys it’s only halfway, indicating that their digestive tract is significantly shorter. Not surprising, perhaps, since they can’t open their jaws anywhere near as wide as a snake<\/a>, nor spend weeks digesting meals, so they eat more regularly, mostly arthropods.<\/p>\n![\"eastern](\"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/GlassLizTail.jpg\")
The distinct change in coloration and the general stubbyness of it indicates that this tail is growing back, and according to that linked source above, adults without<\/em> such regrowth, meaning they’ve never had to drop their tail, are actually rare. There is no indication that this does them any harm at all;<\/strong> it has evolved to be this way, so there’s no reason for it to be painful or debilitating or anything, and in any event, it’s significantly less traumatic than being eaten.<\/p>\n![\"eastern](\"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/GlassLiz2.jpg\")
After getting enough images and confirming the species (and that I wasn’t throwing away a further opportunity for something interesting,) I sent this one on its way back where I found it. Yet another species for the area, and another Find. Very cool.<\/p>\n