Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I realize there are a bunch of conflicting thoughts on Genus species names regarding the ratsnakes, but assuming we keep yellows separate from blacks, was the greenish ever considered its own subspecies? If so, what was the name?

I have see photos of them, but don't know where they are found in the wild. Are they a stable morph like a Gulf Hammock Rat Snake? I have read that they are Black / Yellow intergrades. There were a few for sale in the classifieds.

They are found anywhere the yellow and black ranges overlap, from GA up to NC. Apparently they are a common naturally occuring intergrade. Some find them ugly, but I actually think they're pretty cool.

I am not sure how "stable" they are in terms of patterning/coloring--there seems to be a lot of variation, but it seems it's generally easy to spot out a greenish as opposed to a yellow or a black. Is this what you meant by stable?

By stable, I mean that if you cross two Greenish Rats, all the offsping look like Greenish Rats. I live just north of the Yellow's range, so we never see intergrades in my area.

Yes, they do. I've bred many Greenish Ratsnakes and they all look alike. This goes for many of these so called 'intergrades', such as the Gulf Hammock Ratsnake, the Outer Banks Ratsnake, and so on. I believe genetic predictability is what distinguises a natural intergrade from a home made crossbreed. In Pantherophis obsoletus, it also seems hard to determine whether these 'intergrades' are the result of secundairy contact, or just an intermediate pinpoint within a clinal range of geographical variation. Recent studies seem to support the latter.

I love these guys! I live in an area where this intergrade occurs. They are mostly found in coastal areas form southern VA to northern GA. They were never classified as their own subspecies. If you breed them together they will only produce greenish babies. If you cross them back to either true blacks or yellows, they will produce a muddied wash of a snake that looks more like the respective true race in color. Most of those will also retain all of the juvi pattern. There is only one guy I know of here in costal NC that calls them yellows considering the true range of yellows, but I feel that it is a bit of an insult to the yellows. The color of these guys can vary from a crisp olive drab to an almost slate grey - all in the same area. Also, if you breed a black and a yellow together the offspring will not look like greenish until the F1 gen. and even then it will be a bit brighter than wild caught greenish. I worked with these for 5 years and scrapped the project - then I was given a few wild caughts last month from a friend. I have a 4 foot male who takes FT from tongs and never even rattles his tail! Just an all around great strange rat snake!
Rock On,
-Blue

It depends on your definition of what a Greenish Ratsnake is, and most of all, what isn't. It is not recognized as a subspecies, nor has it ever been. My definition restricts it to the greenish coloured striped snakes from the northern lowlands of Northern Carolina, therefore should be considered as a geographical variant of the Yellow Ratsnake. Other people include all the blotched Black / Greenish intergrades within the definition of the Greenish Ratsnake as well. That definition would make it an intergrade. Nothing wrong with intergrades, BTW.

I don't think the specimen on the picture you posted is a Greenish Ratsnake.

In my area, northeastern South Carolina, I cannot remember the last time that I found either a yellow or a black rat snake. I find only greenish rats, and their patterns and colors vary from olive drab background with profound black stripes to light green with the square pattern in black to a combination of both. I think, at least in my immediate location, that the greenish has become the dominant species, or intergrade as the case may be.