Name of animal-plant: Santa Cruz garter snake

Species name: Thamnophis atratus

Animal type: HERP

Subcategory: snake

Fact:

All animals and plants are given a species name based on a technical term in biological taxnomy. The species name consists of two words and is based on Latin.

The first part of the name identifies the genus to which the species belongs and  the second part identifies the species within the genus. In this animals case it is: Thamnophis atratus