If you’re one of those people who are afraid to swim in lakes, rivers, and the like, here’s another reason for you to stay out of the water: all snakes can swim. Thus, all snakes are technically “water snakes”, even though only some are given that designation, usually due to their propensity to hang out near water.
Snakes swim by moving their body in lateral, wave-like movements, more or less appearing to shape their body in an S pattern. These undulations start from their head and continuing down their body. This is the same type of body movement they’ll use when moving on very smooth surfaces. Using the S-shape movement propagating down their body, the snake can exert a force backwards against the water, which results in them moving forward. Water snakes also use this method to swim, but these types of snakes often have more flattened sides than other snakes, which allows them to swim more efficiently using this motion over their rounded brethren.
It should be noted though that snakes aren’t nearly as dangerous on the whole as many people give them credit for. For one thing, even the most aggressive of snakes will typically avoid attacking humans, if they can help it, unless they feel cornered, and even then they’ll usually give warning before striking. On top of that, around 80% of snakes aren’t significantly harmful to humans, even if they do bite you. Even those that are deadly, most will occasionally not inject venom into you when they strike, simply wanting you to leave. The exact percentage of “dry bites” varies from venomous snake to venomous snake, but, for instance, around 50% of Coral Snake bites are dry bites, delivering no venom.
