Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Could somebody please show (or at least tell) me how to tell the difference between the two ribbon snakes?

I have book here that says this about them:

T proximus: "a dark ventrolateral stripe absent or narrow"
T sauritus: "a dark ventrolateral stripe present and relatively broad"

I'm sorry to ask a question this stupid, but exactly what area should I be looking at? The darker area below the light lateral stripe? It's the sort of thing I really need somebody to spell out for me before I get it. A picture would really say more than a thousand words here.

Thanks in advance.

I'm really sorry for not having a good picture, but this one is of a red-sided garter snake. The snake is rather small, hope you can see what I'm talking about.

Ventral, means below, or on the belly.
Lateral, means on the side.

Ventrolateral just means on the side, but closer to the belly.

Dorsal, is on the back.

In this garter snake, it has one yellow dorsal stripe, and a lateral yellow stripe on either side below it's red spots. This stripe "might" pass as ventrolateral, but anything below it would definately be. Also note that this stripe covers two rows of scales which is a way to measure thickness better than thick and thin.

Good luck with your ribbon snake

Ian

Thanks, that at least cleared it up a bit, although not completely. I would still need to see something like pictures with the differences explained.

I wasn't that far off, I guess. I'm not having any bigger problems with the ventral/lateral/etc concepts, but in this particular case it's harder than usual. I've been comparing ribbon snake pictures for a while now, and I just can't see the difference between the two species.

The ribbon snake isn't mine, I'm just trying to figure the whole ID thing out for somebody I know, who at first thought that it was a sirtalis.

This goes off topic, but it's my thread, so what do I care.

Would you call this a red-sided garter? Is there any way of determining the locality based on a picture such as this?

There are several subspecies of red-sided garter snakes. I'm definately not an expert on this. Some differences I"ve noticed.. the lateral stripe is very wide, 3 scale rows. The red spots aren't red, but this could be a locale thing, or an individual thing.

Ian

>>There are several subspecies of red-sided garter snakes. I'm definately not an expert on this. Some differences I"ve noticed.. the lateral stripe is very wide, 3 scale rows. The red spots aren't red, but this could be a locale thing, or an individual thing.
>>
>>
>>
>>Ian

I meant a parietalis.

I've seen the red spots in them range from orange to deep red to bright red to almost purple. It has to be a locale or individual thing. Or perhaps even a diet thing. And I checked the lateral line earlier, it's 2 scale rows. The first scale row is just light.