Cole,

The "definition of a subspecies" thread you started was interesting reading (most of it, anyway!), but I refrained from posting partly because of the reason you mentioned, but mostly because I had something very specific to share about one (or two?) subspecies and didn't want it to either get lost in the noise or change the scope of the discussion.



I absolutely agree that Williams' book is showing its age, and am looking forward to the next taxonomic overhaul of the species. There's already at least one published addendum/amendment to his description of South American milksnakes, which you can read here:



Notes on the Natural History of the Milksnake Lampropeltis triangulum andesiana Williams, 1978 in Venezuela



Again, only a small number of specimens were examined, but clearly the Venezuelan population has the high (26-35) RBR count one typically associates with andesiana. The high (44-50) subcaudal count is interesting, too... closer to the range of what Williams described as intergrades. It's interesting to imagine how proto-milksnakes changed and evolved as they came across the isthmus of Panama and spread into northern South America. Hopefully, someone is hard at work on analyzing DNA and will come up with a cladistic diagram something like the ones in these papers:



Phylogeography of the California Mountain Kingsnake, Lampropeltis zonata (Colubridae)



Neogene diversification and taxonomic stability in the snake tribe Lampropeltini



I like the maps in the mountain kingsnake paper; they show how a physical boundary (like the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers) can separate subspecies and/or clades.



Here's another excerpt from Lamar's statement about the snakes in question... I've refrained from posting the whole thing, partly because I don't have Bill's (either one's) permission to do so, but mostly because some of his... dispariging... comments about the reptile hobby and herpetoculturists in general. But anyway, this chunk of it is pretty G-rated... well, maybe PG.





Since its inception, the herp import

market has largely been a function of a few key export localities in different

countries. While it is true that these localities receive animals from a

radius, it is also true that they form a pitifully inadequate sample for

herpers to use to educate themselves about a snake. That is why so many were

surprised to learn that the most beautiful "Brazilian" rainbow boas come from

Colombia and Ecuador rather than Brazil, etc. For those old enough to

remember state fairs where a child was handed a fishing pole and encouraged to

drop the line over a partition while an unseen person tied a gift to the hook

and tugged on the line, that is a pretty apt analogy of what we have had to

contend with in terms of imports and our perceptions of "species."



Mother Nature could care less about this and geographic variation is a fact of

life. I am tempted to publish a picture I have of a Lampropeltis in Colombia.

It possesses immaculate red rings and pops like a wet dream. The snake was

collected and photographed at an altitude so high it even exceeds that

published as upper limits for andesiana, yet the snake looks like a

micropholis from the coast. And that would be individual variation, which we

see and accept daily where humans are involved yet we cannot seem to

understand that it can and does occur with snakes as well. The late, great

herpetologist L.C. "Pancho" Stuart once commented, speaking about dichotomous

identification keys, that they work best when one already knows that one has

to identify. And that is true. Since the days of Linnaeus, we have

endeavored to construct cubbyholes and then stuff Nature into them for our own

organizational needs. Now that we have moved boldly into the world of

biochemistry we are seeing more and more that Mother nature simply couldn't

care less about our schemes.



Altitudinal morphs such as gaigei in Costa Rica are nothing more than the same

snake taking on melanin and size characteristics better suited for life at

higher altitudes. Go up the slope and get yourself a "pure gaigei;" go down

the slope until you find a stuarti. Ditto that for micropholis and andesiana.

Lowland micropholis populations from Panama look one way; those from the Choco

of Pacific Colombia another; those from the lowlands of Ecuador, still another.

Move into the inter-Andean valleys of Colombia and you get alphabet soup. Once

the sump that currently contains all the tricolored "milksnakes" is better

understood, I have little doubt that the giant milksnakes from Central American

and northwest South America will form what is known as a clade...they are all

very closely related to one another, if not the same thing.





Interesting, although I wouldn't necessarily say I agree 100%... one of his examples strikes just a little too close to home for me. One of these days I'm going to have to sign up for one of Lamar's eco-tours... just getting to pick his brain for a few days would be worth the price of admission. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go clean up after a couple of my "adult-onset melanistic polyzona" hatchlings and fix myself a midnight snack. Brave new world, indeed!



Nate

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