That's not a whitesided yellow . . . There's actually, as far as I know, no such thing as a whitesided yellow rat. The information I have (second hand, but from the people who caught the animal) says that asides from the whitesided black rat, there was a whitesided rat snake found in Glades County, FL. The animal was assumed to be a yellow rat snake, because of its yellow appearance, but it was later proven to be an Everglades rat (het. offspring when bred with an Everglades produced animals that were obviously as pure as Everglades get, and het. offspring produced with a yellow rat produced obvious intergrades). Many people still assume they are yellow rat snakes, because the homozygous whitesided animals are most definitely yellow, but it has something to do with the gene limiting red pigment. Many people now today are selling "whitesided yellow rat snakes", and many of these were produced by breeding a whitesided by a normal yellow, and then breeding hets, but these should all be intergrades.


Now, there may have been another wild animal found that is whitesided, but I've never heard of any other than the one.


Also, the whitesided gene in Everglades rats is allelic with the whitesided gene in black rats- breed a whitesided 'Glades to a whitesided black, and produce whitesided babies. So, there ARE intergrades on the market that are black x 'Glades. There are also a TON of black x Texas intergrades, which is what I would assume that snake is, if it has that much brown & yellow on it. There are many people who buy a generically labeled "rat snake" and automatically assume it is one or another subspecies, and there are just as many people who don't care about subspecies, but will breed any obsoleta to any other obsoleta.

Hope that doesn't make things more confusing! And also, as always, and especially with obsoleta genetics, this information is all AS I HAVE HEARD IT. There are always contradicting opinions, and it seems like there are a TON of those with obsoleta genetics and taxonomy.

thanks,
Ronnie Nocera

My female whitesided Everglades rat

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