2.3 Historical Range and Distribution

Historically, the eastern indigo snake occurred throughout Florida and in the coastal plain of Georgia, Alabama and Mississippi (Figure 6) (Löding 1922, Haltom 1931, Carr 1940, Cook 16 1954, Diemer and Speake 1983, Lohoefener and Altig 1983, Moler 1985a, Enge et al. 2013, entire). Although there are unsubstantiated reports of eastern indigo snakes from South Carolina, the species was removed from South Carolina’s state list of native reptiles and amphibians in 2009 because of a lack of evidence that it ever occurred there as a part of the native fauna. In addition, the lack of any historic or recent records within the Savannah River Drainage in Georgia, adjacent to South Carolina, supports this contention (Enge et al. 2013, p.295).