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You may be right, Southerns do look more like Easterns on the outside. But, I'll believe anything now with most N.A. snakes. Given the kind of hybridization that has been shown across even Genus lines. Interesting to note, that both the fossil record and DNA, seem to show that the Southern Hognose is closer to the Westerns, then the Eastern. The Eastern sits as an outsider in a way- genetically, and in some characteristics of the vertebrae. The early hognoses that show up in the fossil record about 25 million years ago had some features more in line with H. platirhinos. However, we have to be careful since the evidence is based on a few bones, and vertebrae. The guy that pioneered fossil snake studies, Alan Holman recently passed away. The book "Fossil Snakes" is an excellent book to read if your interested in this kind of stuff. Auffenberg also did some early ID'ing of fossil hognoses.



And to continue on my tangent, an animal that gave rise supposedly to our Heterodon, Paleoheterodon, was also in Europe around the time it showed up in North America. One species from a rather GREAT skeleton, shows that the skull "might" have been really different in the Miocene with some possible ornamentation over the eyes. There was also some other more modern forms(closer to our time)in the south (H. brevis is one, and there's even some fossils sitting in bins still un-identified from some of those deposits). H. brevis died out and is only known from the fossil record.



Best,

Kenny

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