>>Mark:
>>
>>I was reading through the posts from last month and thought of something to add to your post "Are you warming up to Scotophis as the Latin genus moniker for the woodland rat snakes?
>>I was barely able to stomach Pantherophis!!".
>>
>>Here's my appraisal as a simple hobbyist:
>>
>>
>> Ratsnake Taxonomy
>>
>>Those who view ratsnakes as just fun and games
>>Never get riled about kinship and names.
>>A ratsnake’s a ratsnake as far as they care
>>As long as it eats mice and its sidewall is square.
>>They want it to feed and they want it alive
>>They want it to breed and the hatchlings to thrive.
>>They want it to drink from a round plastic bowl
>>And they’d like it to look like a barbershop pole.
>>These things mean the world to the average hobbyist
>>But they mean less than nothing to the serious taxonomist.
>>
>>Where the one sees an orange phase E. lindheimeri
>>The other sneers caustically and opines contrary.
>>“Why that’s nothing at all but a plain obsoletus
>>And your naming convention is plain obsolete t’us.
>>No one says Elaphe for those anymore
>>That kind of ignorance is surely a bore”.
>>Pantherophis was trendy way back in ‘05
>>But Scotophis replaced it and made it seem jive.
>>Now all of the cladists who hang in the ‘hood
>>Use Pituophis for ratsnake and say it is good.
>>
>>If a snake-guy speaks up and states his objection
>>He’s sure to be given a long-winded correction.
>>In a flash he’s beseiged by a swarm of detractors
>>Clarifying his errors with technical factors.
>>Similarities of structure, lifestyle and form
>>Are swept to the side with derision and scorn.
>>“Sure they both look the same and feed just alike
>>But that argument already has come down the pike.
>>We’ve heard it before and we certainly don’t buy it.
>>We aren’t convinced so don’t even try it.
>>Just look at this cladogram in plain black and white
>>The branches are solid, the numbers are tight.
>>Those families are separated by three different levels
>>They’re as different as if they were angels and devils”.
>>
>>So thoroughly chastened the snake-guy retreats
>>He can’t speak the language, it’s too hard a feat.
>>If he happens to have a background in science
>>He may pick up some books as an act of defiance.
>>He’ll read about cloning DNA mitochondrial
>>He’ll stay up all night behaving insomnial.
>>
>>Eventually he’ll be able to the read through this stuff
>>And know what is solid and know what is guff.
>>And what does he find when he’s gotten this far?
>>That a bunch of what’s out there is wholly sub-par.
>>The probability values for the branches as shown
>>Would get you thrown out if they were odds on a loan.
>>Thirty percent or per cent forty two
>>Is hardly enough to define as a clue.
>>Instead of using these studies it always prevails
>>To select for the truth by a flip heads or tails.
>>
>>And then if you read what the science types say
>>About these same studies, the yea and the nay,
>>You’ll soon come to see that it’s not quite transparent
>>As to what’s still a guess and what’s most apparent.
>>
>>“What you take for kinship is only convergence”
>>“Have you gone mad! That’s dispersive divergence.
>>They’ll point out a clear case of symplesiomorphy
>>Or debate homoplasy versus synapomorphy.
>>They’ll argue for Bayesian versus strict parsimony
>>They’ll say that the Cladists are full of baloney.
>>
>>They’ll argue these points till the cows have come home
>>And when all’s said and done they’ll have written a tome.
>>But the answer of whether they’re Elaphe or not
>>Will have advanced back or forth not even a jot.
>>
>>So my advice to the hobbyist there scratching his head
>>Is call them whatever you want without dread.
>>The eggheads have pondered and tested and claimed
>>But a ratsnake’s a ratsnake whatever it’s named.
>>
>>
>>Regards
>>John
>>



John
You are a master.
We Are Not Worthy !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I bow before you...or at least before my monitor.
excellent!



-----
Corn snakes and rat snakes..No one can have just one.
"Resistance is futile"
Jimmy Johnson
(Draybar)
Draybars Snakes

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