Nice summary from Toby. We've been sharing similar info for quite awhile.

King, I was in the one species (guttata) camp for a very long time. However, we don't have examples of intergrades to show the continuation of the species bt. Pantherophis (Elaphe) emoryi emoryi and P. guttatus slowinskii that I know of. I've switched to the two species theory based on the fact that emoryi and guttatus seem to have been separated for a very long time and are morphologically distinct. There seems to be gaps bt. ranges of the two species. If we were to find areas where they were intergrading I likely would buy back into the one species theory. But for now it seems like the two species idea works well. I don't like the idea of basing our decisions on mtdna either, but think it should be a combination of things.

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• Where does emoryi stop and slowinskii... - gratefuldead, Thu Jul 24 15:36:02 2008
• RE: Where does emoryi stop and slowinskii... - gratefuldead, Thu Jul 24 18:21:12 2008
• RE: Where does emoryi stop and slowinskii... - BillMcgElaphe, Fri Jul 25 08:49:47 2008
• RE: Where does emoryi stop and slowinskii... - tbrock, Fri Jul 25 20:53:18 2008
• RE: Where does emoryi stop and slowinski - CKing, Sat Jul 26 17:46:43 2008
• RE: Where does emoryi stop and slowinski - gratefuldead, Mon Jul 28 12:08:49 2008
• RE: Where does emoryi stop and slowinski - CKing, Mon Jul 28 17:06:15 2008
• RE: Where does emoryi stop and slowinski - ratsnakehaven, Sun Aug 3 13:13:21 2008
• Didn't post my reply above... - ratsnakehaven, Sun Aug 3 13:16:07 2008