Thanks, Rainer. I like it a lot too. The best explanation I can come up with is when comparing this morph to a very similar and pretty much identical morph found in the Central Valley of Northern CA known as the Delta morph or Davis morph by most people. That morph is very common in some areas representing over 50% of the population, but in some areas it has been found to be quite rare. Those areas might be on the outer limits of its range as I've noticed other Cal king morphs have areas where they are very common , but the closer you get to their outer limits, the rarer they are. Scissors Crossing is a perfect example. I'm guessing the area these Striped Mud morphs are found, are in an area they naturally were rare to begin with. Because most of the habitat in Los Angeles County is developed, there are only a few places left to search. Most of these places have not turned up this morph. Its possible this morph was more common in other areas that are now developed, but we will never know for sure. The striped Mud morph is nothing more than a Whittier aberrant. A Whittier morph is identical to this except its banded, just like how the Delta morph has a banded and an aberrant version. The Whittier morph turned up many years ago (70's or 80's) in Whittier and also again in the 80's in Palos Verdes. Those two areas have been hunted for years and to my knowledge, have not tuned up another specimen since. A juvenile Striped mud was first found around 2000 in West LA by Don Huffman. He then found a second one (adult and both are females) a few years later in the same locale. After that Hubbs and his close friends searched that place like crazy with boardlines going up all over the place. I even searched there for a few years since 2006 and never found any. It was like one big contest to see who would turn the next one up. It wasn't until just this spring when another kingsnake hunter finally turned up a 3rd specimen of the Striped Mud there. (continued..
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