How do black snakes kill copperheads?

It's a fairly docile snake. Their favorite foods are small mammals such as mice, rats and other small rodents. They will climb very easily up into shrubbery, trees, and try to get into birds' nests. They will eat the eggs or even the young bird. read more

Black racers do occasionally kill and eat other snakes. Black rat snakes, however, aren’t known for snake killing. In fact, they sometimes will even hibernate with other species of snakes, including copperheads and rattlesnakes. Myth #2: Black snakes mate with copperheads. There’s a common myth that black snakes have interbred with copperheads to create a venomous black snake. That’s not true. read more

The young snakes are often confused with the copperheads because the young black rat snakes don’t look like the adults. They don’t have the solid black color yet. They are kind of grayish with dark black to brown splotches. read more

Perhaps the confusion might arise from the superficial similarity in appearance to the Eastern Kingsnake (Lampropeltis getula) or another similar species. Kingsnakes do, indeed, eat other snakes, including venomous ones. In the case of the Kingsnake, they kill the other snake by constriction, just as they would a rodent. read more