Skip to main content
Glite Dictionary
gopher snake

gopher snake

1 7.0
A large North American snake that is not venomous and lives in burrows eating rodents
  • noun
  • /ˈɡoʊfər sneɪk/
  • US
translation icon : serpiente gopher
  • While hiking in the desert, I spotted a gopher snake slithering by a rock.

Examples

  • The gopher snake burrowed into the ground, searching for small rodents to eat.

  • We brought home a gopher snake.

    Fiction book (2001)

  • Didn't you tell him to use the gopher snake?

    Bronco Billy (1980)

  • Why don't you use the gopher snakes?

    Bronco Billy (1980)

  • But let me tell you, the biggest gopher snake that ever lived came in our chickenhouse and swallowed that wood egg and died!

    Fiction book (1996)

  • Farmers often appreciate gopher snakes because they help control the rodent population.

Synonyms

snake
vsgopher snake
427 1.0

A long animal without legs covered in scales that sometimes has poison

is a specific nonvenomous North American species rather than any reptile
bullsnake
vsgopher snake
  • US
8.2

A large harmless North American snake that eats mice and rats and often lives in burrows

is the wider species category that includes this particular type

Surface Forms

gopher snake singular
gopher snakes plural

Morphology

gopher + snake

The compound 'gopher snake' straightforwardly denotes a snake associated with gophers (i.e., a snake that lives in gopher burrows or feeds on gophers), so its referent can be inferred from 'gopher' + 'snake'. This noun-compounding pattern is compositional and cross-linguistically common, so an average B1 learner who knows both constituents is likely to understand the meaning.

Etymology

Gopher snake links gopher and snake because these snakes often go into gopher burrows to hunt for gophers and other small rodents. That's why the name means a large, not-poisonous snake that often lives in holes and eats rodents.