THE CENTER FOR NORTH AMERICAN HERPETOLOGY
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Reptilia    Squamata (part-snakes)    Dipsadidae  

Common Sharp-tailed Snake
Contia tenuis (Baird and Girard, 1852)
KOHN-tee-ah — TEN-you-iss

SSAR 9th Edition Comments:
 There are no current SSAR comments for this taxon.

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Open icons indicate questionable records, including those with coordinate uncertainty greater than 10,000 m (approximately 6 miles); click a marker to view record details.
Occurrences:; 3,993 Total; 1,091 Museum; 2,902 Other
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Range maps are based on curated specimens and provided gratis by CNAH. - (Version: 2023.07.26.10.15.26)
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Province/State Distribution:
Canada: British Columbia
United States: California Oregon Washington

Taxonomic Etymology:
A small, slender snake with a pointed tail.
Contia — A patronym honoring John Lawrence LeConte (1825–1883), a prominent American entomologist and naturalist, with the Latinized form Contia derived from “Conte.”
tenuis — From Latin tenuis, meaning “thin,” “slender,” or “delicate.” Refers to the snake’s slender build.

First instance(s) of published English names:
Gentle Brown Snake (Contia mitis: Cooper, James G. 1869. The fauna of California and its geographical distribution. Proceedings of the California Academy of Sciences 4():61-81); Purple-tailed Snake (Contia mitis: Yarrow, Henry C. 1882. Check list of North American Reptilia and Batrachia with catalogue of specimens in U. S. National Museum. Bulletin of the United States National Museum (24):1-249); Oregon Worm Snake (Lodia tenuis: Yarrow, Henry C. 1882. Check list of North American Reptilia and Batrachia with catalogue of specimens in U. S. National Museum. Bulletin of the United States National Museum (24):1-249); Sharp-tailed Snake (Contia mitis: Van Denburgh, John. 1897. The reptiles of the Pacific Coast and Great Basin: An account of the species known to inhabit California, and Oregon, Washington, Idaho, and Nevada. Occasional Papers of the California Academy of Sciences 5():9-236); Sharp-tailed Snake (Contia tenuis: Schmidt, Karl P. 1953. A Check List of North American Amphibians and Reptiles. 6th Edition. University of Chicago Press, Chicago, Illinois. 280pp.);

Taxon Links:

  
Catalog of American Amphibians and Reptiles
  
The Reptile Database
  
NatureServe
  
iNaturalist
  
GenBank
  
USGS - Nonindigenous Aquatic Species Database

Selected References:
1852 Baird, Spencer F. and Charles Girard. Descriptions of new species of reptiles, collected by the U. S. Exploring Expedition under the command of Capt. Charles Wilkes, U. S. N., First Part including the species from the western part of America. Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia 6:174-177
1951 Stickel, William H. Distinctions between the snake genera Contia and Eirenis. Herpetologica 7:125-132
1970 Bury, R. Bruce, Franklin Gress, and George C. Gorman. Karyotypic survey of some colubrid snakes from western North America. Herpetologica 26(4):461-466
1998 Leonard, William P. and Ovaska, Kristiina. Contia, C. tenuis. Catalogue of American Amphibians and Reptiles (677):1-7
2002 Feldman, Chris R. and Greg S. Spicer. Mitochondrial variation in Sparp-tailed Snakes (Contia tenuis): Evidence of a cryptic species. Journal of Herpetology 36(4):648-655
2006 Hoyer, Richard F., Ryan P. O'Donnell, and Robert T. Mason. Current distribution and status of Sharp-tailed Snakes (Contia tenuis) in Oregon. Northwestern Naturalist 87(3):195-202
2019 Rensel, Leah J, Ruth L Milner, Marc P Hayes, and Doug A Mccutchen. Discoveries of the Common Sharp-Tailed Snake (Contia tenuis) in the San Juan Islands, Washington, 2013–2017. Northwestern Naturalist 100(1):48-55

THE CENTER FOR NORTH AMERICAN HERPETOLOGY — Accessed: Tuesday 11 August 2026 05:00 CT