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During a post-Thanksgiving visit to friends who live in the Texas Hill Country about 50 miles WNW of San Antonio, I was surprised to find this large adult male Baird's Ratsnake (Elaphe bairdi) stretched across a backroad about 15 meters above a still-running creek.

The temperatures during the preceding several days had been mild and the air temperature at midday when he was found was 75F. The elevation is ca. 1330 feet and the macrohabitat suggested Texas Rats (E. o. lindheimeri) somewhat more than bairdi (both occur in the general area but are presumed to be separated by habitat differences). This date (25 NOV) is my personal latest of season for activity in this species. Typical of the species, he was extremely mild-mannered and the photos fail to do him justice.

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Tom Lott
Thornscrub

>>During a post-Thanksgiving visit to friends who live in the Texas Hill Country about 50 miles WNW of San Antonio, I was surprised to find this large adult male Baird's Ratsnake (Elaphe bairdi) stretched across a backroad about 15 meters above a still-running creek.
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>>The temperatures during the preceding several days had been mild and the air temperature at midday when he was found was 75F. The elevation is ca. 1330 feet and the macrohabitat suggested Texas Rats (E. o. lindheimeri) somewhat more than bairdi (both occur in the general area but are presumed to be separated by habitat differences). This date (25 NOV) is my personal latest of season for activity in this species. Typical of the species, he was extremely mild-mannered and the photos fail to do him justice.
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Beautiful bairdi.
great find, especially this late in the season.
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Corn snakes and rat snakes..No one can have just one.
"Resistance is futile"
Jimmy Johnson
(Draybar)
Draybars Snakes

_____

n/p
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Tom Lott
Thornscrub

wow, nice find. I have never seen one so far north.
What was the nearest town?
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...and I think to myself, "What a wonderful world."

it was a lot farther west than north. Bandera County, to be exact. The nearest "town" would be Tarpley.
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Tom Lott
Thornscrub

Good to hear from you over here, Tom.
Didn't you find an area a few years ago where it looked strongly like bairdi and lindheimeri were crossing?

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Regards, Bill McGighan

Bill,

Yeah, I was fairly confident in my ability to predict which habitats would produce bairdi and which would produce lindheimeri until this guy showed up in the "wrong" place. As the venerable Kauffeld once said, snakes don't read books!

Over the years I've found at least four specimens that I couldn't definitely peg as one or the other; all were from Bandera County. One of these had the bairdi coloration but the more robust body form/mass of lindheimeri; it also had more squarish blotch remnants than is usual in bairdi. Three others were from the Sabinal Canyon in the western part of the county and looked more like highly melanistic lindheimeri (so dark that blotch counts could not be taken) but they lacked the characteristic lindheimeri pugnacity. Chris Harrison posted a photo of a snake very similar to these that was taken at Lost Maples State Natural Area in the same canyon. Even though this snake was clearly intermediate to me, supposedly Dr. Jim Dixon of Texas A&M pronounced it a Bairds. I think this questionable specimen was also so large that it currently holds the record length for "bairdi." I'm reluctant to question authority in this case, but still . . .

Part of the problem, I suspect, is that no one knows what hybrids between these two very closely related species look like. Additionally, when hybrids are produced, they probably cross back into both parent species to such an extent that the whole spectrum of variation between the two pure forms is represented among various degrees of "hybrids." If these "hybrids" were more common and widespread, it might suggest intergradation. Who knows!

Good to hear from you.
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Tom Lott
Thornscrub

Thanks again for sharing that animal, Tom.
The Sabinal Canyon animals sound really interesting. Hybrids here have fascinated me.
I saw Chris’s pic and that also was an interesting animal. (His pictures are always great, too.)

Tom said:
“Part of the problem, I suspect, is that no one knows what hybrids between these two very closely related species look like.”
Your right. I found an animal south of Junction that I thought was a mix, but it keyed out as lindheimeri .
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This is a captive contrived juvenile (an accident).
Mom was a Texas / Dad was a Bairds.
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Closer you can see the blotches are squarer, but there is allot of Bairds showing.
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Regards, Bill McGighan

Bill, I bet that turns out to be a stunning looking snake!
Todd Hughes

Texas/Bairds
I really don't have much interest in keeping hybrids, but I am curious how this will look as an adult.

Is the TR typical of your area, Todd?
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Regards, Bill McGighan

I would say this is typical of Calhoun county and probably all southern forms as well. This one was exposed in a cash register it was using to brumate in in Jan. '04 It was in shed and was mildly parasitized, with the normal p.o.'ed temper to boot! I am not into crossing them but would be interested in seeing a naturally occurring intergrade.
Todd Hughes

Bill,

Wow! Thanks for posting those shots of your hybrid. To me, it simply shouts HYBRID, especially with the pronounced orange wash (at that age), the amount of space between the squared blotches, and even the apparently subdued "burglar's mask." The questionable ones encountered in the field are generally more subtle. Congratulations on producing that little gem -- accident or not!

I think part of the confusion concerning "hybrids" between these two species in the Hill Country relates to the fact that many fail to realize that lindheimeri, at least in the western portion of its range, frequently sports dusky longitudinal stripes much like those of bairdi. These stripes may be hardly noticeable to quite pronounced and they are present in lindheimeri from both below and above the Balcones Escarpment. In fact, I would estimate that the majority of the many lindheimeri I have seen from the Leon Creek and Medina River basins of SW Bexar County (San Antonio, well below the Escarpment) sported such stripes. This is even immortalized in the lindheimeri plates in Wright and Wright's excellent old (1957) Handbook of Snakes, although their snake was allegedly from Brownsville.

Here are two old slides (circa 1970) of a DOR Hill Country lindheimeri from about 14 miles west of the locality of the bairdi I posted above. The second shot especially shows how the stripes pass through the extended corners of the dorsal blotches. If a key is not based on the presence/absence of stripes, however, these will key out to lindheimeri.

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Tom Lott
Thornscrub

Heheh, there is even a little Texas map on that ones' blotch in the foreground of your pic. Tom, got any blatent looking crosses?
Todd Hughes

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Regards, Bill McGighan

Don't you just love Texas? I know I do! Nice find and thanks for the field report.
Todd Hughes

Todd,

Yes, it's hard to beat a place where you can herp all year round, if you wish. In fact, I think I do more herping during the cooler months than during the oppressive heat of summertime.

Regards,
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Tom Lott
Thornscrub

I hear that! The indigos were in full swing a week ago, and I saw a dor meahlly trying to get back to its' home yesterday before the front with an obvious hairy meal hanging out of it. I even get to see sea turtles in Port Aransas during these chilly months, I love it!
Todd Hughes

Great post and nice bairdi!

-Toby Brock

Photo: yearling male bairdi from Davis Mountains stock, in a shed cycle.

Toby, that one is coloring up well! Let's go flip some stuff! Holler!
Todd Hughes

Thanks Todd. He looks better with every shed, but I have a hard time catching his colors in a photo.

I flipped some a/c in Kingsville fairly recently (65*F - 70*F, sunny, late morning), perfect conditions, I thought, and got nothing. About a mile down the road, I found a very fresh DOR TX patchnose. My co-workers saw an adult checkered garter at the airport, the night before the big cold front, also. Got family stuff Sat, but maybe Sunday for some cruisin' and flippin'.

-Toby

n/p
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Tom Lott
Thornscrub

>>The temperatures during the preceding several days had been mild and the air temperature at midday when he was found was 75F. The elevation is ca. 1330 feet and the macrohabitat suggested Texas Rats (E. o. lindheimeri) somewhat more than bairdi (both occur in the general area but are presumed to be separated by habitat differences). This date (25 NOV) is my personal latest of season for activity in this species. Typical of the species, he was extremely mild-mannered and the photos fail to do him justice.
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>>Tom Lott
>>Thornscrub

Tom, great natural history notes, and a cool looking snake. I noticed it has nine supralabials. This character is not all that common on "obsoleta", but moreso on "bairdi". Pretty neat.

I would think that a hybrid would be hard to place, with what you've shown on them, where they could lean toward either species. ASAMOF, it looks like the two spp. in this area are hard to tell apart sometimes. In looking at Schulz, '96, I did notice some scalation differences though. He has bairdi with 234-264 ventrals and 81-105 subcaudals, whereas, he has o. lindheimeri with 218-238 ventrals and 72-88 subcaudals. Not too much overlap there. Still, an interesting situation, especially if they hybridize easily whenever they come into contact.

You guys are killin' me with all the stuff you see in TX all the time. My main interest right now are the scrub rats, "guttatus", but I'm interested in any situation where there are questions about species vs. subspecies. Hopefully, I'll get to spend more time out there after retirement, maybe visit my dad in Austin or sister in San Antone, or one of the many lucky herpers who live in that great State.

Keep it comin'.

Terry Cox

Terry,

Thanks for the kind words and good catch on the nine supralabials on that specimen; I hadn't even noticed. That was once considered a distinguishing character for bairdi, but with more eastern specimens available, it has been shown to be inconsistent at best. I've even found a few lindheimeri around San Antonio had nine on at least one side.

I didn't mean to imply that snakes from the Edwards Plateau are hard to diagnose. Actually about 95% of specimens taken can instantly be pegged as one or the other. The other 5%, however, are interesting. One must simply remember that stripes alone do not a bairdi make; as you noted, the ventral and subcaudal counts are more reliable, along with the dorsal blotches.

I must confess to being a recent convert to meahllmorum as a valid subspecies of emoryi/guttatus, although I've always realized that snakes from the Hill Country and west Texas "looked different" from the large south Texas snakes. It's really sad how much of the habitat has been altered (i.e., plowed up) in the areas that could best harbor intergrades between slowinskii and meahllmorum. Obviously, this kind of thing interests me also. Let me know when you are going to be in the area sometime and perhaps we can "mount an expedition!"
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Tom Lott
Thornscrub

Tom, thanks for your invite. Texas is so awesome and there seems to be a lot of herpers there too, not surprisingly. My dad has retired there and I'll be retiring to AZ in the next couple years. I plan to visit TX as often as I can. I went to the IHS in San Antonio last summer, met up with Toby Brock, and spent a couple days around Corpus Christi and the coast. He has an avid interest in the Guttata Complex also, especially western forms. I think the situation of the eastern guttata meeting the western guttata with very few intergrades on record is terribly interesting. I would love to be able to prove they are separate species, or otherwise. Hopefully, we can find some specimens in the strategic areas starting next summer.

I think the situation bt bairdi and obsoleta is interesting also. It would be great to find some intergrades/hybrids bt. these species to add to the data on this situation. It reminds me of a situation in the area around Milwaukee, Wisconsin, that of the Butler's garter vs. the Plains garter snake. Even though they are considered separate species, many examples of intermediate forms have been found in this area, which are seen as hybrids by most, but could be considered intergrades by others. Two closely related species, that may interbreed fairly easily when in contact, brings up some terribly interesting questions about the taxonomy. Some folks I know are working on that and think the T. butleri there are genetically different from other butleri, and genetic studies are in progress on this species.

Enough meanderings, but food for thought. Looking forward to wandering around in the Hill Country, and up on the plateau, one of these days. The scrub rats (guttata/emoryi) are pretty cool looking up there. Let us know if you find any, especially if any pop up in winter. The guys along the coast have seen several lately.

Cheers...Terry

Terry, if you do meander this way next year, please shoot me a line, as I would be interested in tagging along or showing you an interesting find down here. Tom, I likewise extend the invitation in your direction should you feel the need to wander south. These rats are surrounding me, but I think slowinski are a mere 90 miles nor'east of me. Wish I woulda scraped the snake up but I forgot my spatula, looked very corny to me!
Todd Hughes

Todd, you can be sure I'll holler at ya', if I get down in that neighborhood. I'd sure like to after the great time I had cruisin' up and down the coast along with Toby last summer. Of course, trying to find a week that isn't busy and that I can afford the trip will be challenging. But I'd love to spend a little more time around Brownsville, Brazos Island, Kingsville, etc, and up towards Port Lavaca. I'd love to find one of these...

...up near Port Lavaca, Calhoun or Matagorda Co.

I remember a trip I took many years ago and just hung out along the coast enjoying the weather and being near the ocean, doing some road cruising evenings and mornings. It was a lot of fun. A little older now, but ready for my second childhood..haha!

Thanks for the invite....TC

Second? HAHA! Iam heavily into my third childhood but these dang responsibilities keep gettin' in the way! I will be waiting and herping!
Todd Hughes