Reptile & Amphibian Forums

The snake in photos, below, came out of a bag of mulch purchased from a pet store. The store claims it is an escapee and is a "Mexican Black Snake." The mulch company says they recognize the snake but doubt it would have survived the mulching process. Please e-mail me at joez@devMLS.com if you can identify it. Thanks, Joe.

That's actually a melanistic phase of striped California Kingsnake(Lampropeltis gelulus californiae) native to the same desert area. Also looks like it is probably a male from what I can see, it looks pretty thick at the cloaca(vent).

Here is a "50/50" banded example of the same subspecies.

~Doug

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"Better to be silent and thought a fool, than to open mouth and remove any doubt!"

Lookit that stripe! Never seen a striped mbk before but it sure does look like one, possibly a melanistic cal king from Ariz?
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Todd Hughes

Score! Where can I buy a bag of this mulch???
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Diego

Sort of like a box of "Cracker Jacks"!,......except that inside every bag of mulch, is a free random species of snake!

I like that concept!.......but you need to be VERY cautious of the bag that contains the "Inland Taipan", or the "fer-de-lance"!

~Doug
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"Better to be silent and thought a fool, than to open mouth and remove any doubt!"

Those don't scare me as much as the Red Spitter boxes!
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Diego

n/p
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"Better to be silent and thought a fool, than to open mouth and remove any doubt!"

conjunctus

is the banded morph from the lower Baja peninsula.

and the "nitida" is the striped morph from the same area, only a different phenotype of the same.

~Doug
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"Better to be silent and thought a fool, than to open mouth and remove any doubt!"

NP

It's a Cape kingsnake (L. g. nitida) from the cape region of Baja California.
They don't consider them a valid ssp anymore, & are listing them as Cal kings. I still call them nitida.
The Mexican black kings are blacker & don't have a stripe.
Cheers,
Max
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"And the rest is all in his head"