Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hi,

A number of you were following a thread that sorta concluded several days ago--from exhaustion? Just so no one overlooks it, i got brian hubbs' permission to post the part of his range map pertinent to the albino discussion. It's at this link, if you wanna take a look at it:

http://forums.kingsnake.com/view.php?id=1737532,1739450

that'll throw you into the middle of the thread, too.

Good deal Terry!,.....

Yes, "Hubbie" has got all sorts of awesome range maps inside his new book, among zillions of other very detailed and informative things. The book is just amazing, that's really all there is to say!. There is no book on planet earth that even comes CLOSE to his regarding the getula complex.

Another thing that is very interesting, he included a few different maps here and there to depict old, out-dated ones, and to also let other's conclude their own opinions as to which ones are more accurate as well. Brian and I went over a few of these, and we both agreed on a few that he showed me regarding floridana, etc...

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

The book is just amazing, that's really all there is to say!. There is no book on planet earth that even comes CLOSE to his regarding the getula complex.

At the Expo I think I TOLD you to buy his book, eh? I told lots of people to Buy Brians book while at the expo, but they didn't. I even walked some folks over and showed them his table. Still they did not buy it. A lot of people that post here didn't.

IMO KS should make new a rule. Anyone who does not own a copy and has read it cannot post here. Rainers law.

It really is a book you can't put down. One of the best investments i have made.
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www.Bluerosy.com

No,...I planned on hunting him down at the show months prior to buy one. Actually, that was one of my main missions while I was there.

Yeah, I showed the book to a lot of folks too, but few went ahead and dug into their pockets to actually GET one..LOL! Hard for me to understand really. Some people think if it doesn't wiggle, why buy it.

In between doing things at his table, a good friend of mine had his nose burried in my copy, and couldn't believe how informative this book actually WAS!. He told me he was DEFINITELY going to buy one, he just couldn't afford it right then.

To me, this was an absolute MUST-HAVE, and there was no way I was leaving there without it.

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

>>...IMO KS should make new a rule. Anyone who does not own a copy and has read it cannot post here. Rainers law.

I propose an amendment to the law: I think you meant to say anyone who has NOT read it cannot post here.

With that amendment, i vote for Rainers law. Brilliant.

IMO KS should make new a rule. Anyone who does not own a copy and has read it cannot post here. Rainers law.

I propose an amendment to the law: I think you meant to say anyone who has NOT read it cannot post here.

HA HA!
Well you can OWN a copy and not have read it. So..

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www.Bluerosy.com

does that still qualify????

What? Hubbs writes snake books?
Why didn't he ever mention it?

Now I'm even more confused because since there isn"t a Chattanooga River my snake is most like from Chattooga River origin. According to that map it would key out as a chain king if I'm reading it right. Sheesh.
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Steve W.

Well, sort'a, and not necessarily..LOL!

I looked at this from my "google earth" interactive program, and that Chattooga River goes all over the place, and a big intergrade zone is real close as well to where the few states intersect. Now if you can tell me EXACTLY where this was captured, and I mean EXACTLY, then I can narrow this all the way down to a particular rock next to the river. I did this with some locality data I had on a gravid South Florida Mole King from many years ago. I have a marker on the exact dirt road intersection that this snake was captured from, from a real satelite image to boot.

I can even see my truck in the front yard of my friggin' house with this thing..LOL!

All I know is, like Terry mentioned, I certainly wouldn't go backwards with this thing and breed it to a nigra, there would be no point in that at all. There is no way to reverse anything done from the past anyway, so just go with what you want to do at this point in time, and have it knock boots with a L.g.g., simple as that really.

I'll say it again, that's a majestic looking animal, whatever the case was,.... or is.

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

I got it a while back and the only information I got was the Chattanooga River as the answer which is apparently the Chattooga River. LOL
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Steve W.

Not to discredit it but I'd be interested in how many specimens were examined to delineate that range map? One must keep in mind that range maps are guides only. The more data used the more precise the result and even then its a snapshot in time!

To me this is a classic example of how the purity thing doesn't fit real well with the subspecies concept. Even if you had the exact capture location to place on the map you'd have a fraction of the information needed to determine if the snake was a "pure" eastern or not. Given its proximity to the recognized range limit you'd also need additional data from, not of just the original albino, but of others specimens from the same and adjacent collection sites.
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“Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind.” Emmerson

Tony,.....

Yes, 100% agreed!. There is no single part of any of this equation that would prove anything just soley by itself one way or another. Many things would also have to be considered, such as those very things you just mentioned. All good points that many tend to overlook or never begin to consider.

Oh well, what can ya do?..LOL!

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

"Oh well, what can ya do?"

Just enjoy the animals!
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“Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind.” Emmerson

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

>>To me this is a classic example of how the purity thing doesn't fit real well with the subspecies concept. Even if you had the exact capture location to place on the map you'd have a fraction of the information needed to determine if the snake was a "pure" eastern or not....

Tony, you're smarter than me about these things: I think we need a different term than "pure,". What would be a better way to refer to animals from a subspecies range--whether smack in the middle of a range, or close to the margins but NOT in an intergrade zone? As you say, "purity" doesn't fit well with our understanding of what's going on. So what's the more accurate term?

I think if we began using a different, less specific, term we'd all more often find some agreement. And that's a good thing, right?

Maybe it is human nature to try and fit everything into a box because we think nature made it that way.

IMO things are changing to fast to lable it in this precise time.
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www.Bluerosy.com

You are not Miss Grammar from that other forum?
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www.Bluerosy.com

"Tony, you're smarter than me about these things"

Doubtfull, But this is where I'm at. Locality can be pure beyond that there is just classic phenotype but too often that is not well defined. To illustrate is a "classic" king represented by Howies wide banded Pungo Ridge line or the thin banded ones from Hillson's NJ line?

In the case at hand, the original animal was not classic it was an albino, we also know it was at least from the extreme end of the range if not from well into the range of nigra so it would not have been highly representative of all eastern even if it weren't an albino! To me this is a case of it is what it is and its just an albino kingssnake. Given the approximate local of the originating animal it could be outcrossed to nigra, which is at most
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“Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind.” Emmerson

I was real exceited to get one of these when they came out for $2000. I waited for the expo and when i was at the breeders table to purchase, I held one for the first time. From working with producing many hybrids at that time, I knew right then this was not a pure eastern king. I was disspointed and gave the snake back to the breeder.

Since then i am sure people have back bred the originals to pure easterns. Making them much more authentic today .
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www.Bluerosy.com

>>... I did this with some locality data I had on a gravid South Florida Mole King from many years ago. I have a marker on the exact dirt road intersection that this snake was captured from, from a real satelite image to boot.

Can I make a pitch for taking geotagged photos at collection sites? You get a photo to remind you of the habitat, and a precise location (which incidentally can link with google earth to give you even more views of the location).

Big DSLRs can use external devices.

For compact cameras easy to always have at hand when you're in the field, the Nikon P6000 is the only choice. It can take a disappointingly long time, sometimes, to get a fix; Other times it gets a quick fix and adjusts it as you walk around. Mixed bag. It's been out almost a year and i keep hoping Nikon will improve the GPS technology, or that another maker--Canon, maybe--would bring out a competitive product. But so far, no go.

You can also use an Apple iPhone. With the phone's "Location Services" turned on, any pix you take with it will be tagged. The iPhone seems to get fixes reliably and in seconds, so it's puzzled me why the bigger-bodied P6000 can't match that performance. Of course, the iPhone pix aren't nearly the quality of the Nikon's. But they do have this nice feature: import them (or pix tagged using either of the other two methods described here) into Apple's iPhoto, and when you click on a little icon on the image viewer, the photo rolls over to reveal a map with the geotagged location marked by a pin. AND using iPhoto's "places" feature, you can see a map with ALL the tagged photos in your photo library: click on a location, and it'll take you to all those photos.

Lastly, you can use the iPhone and take a higher-quality photo at the same site at the same time with a better camera. You can then batch process images using software that matches the TIME the iPhone pix were taken--and tagged--and then transfers the tagging to the better-camera pix taken at the same time. A cool process, though it's an added step in the workflow.

I think there are some great tools here to enhance our observations. In fact I think i'll post this on the field collecting forum, too, though it might not be a new subject there.

here's what you see when you click on the little "places" icon on a geotagged photo in Apple's iPhoto. The locations can be off by 10 or 20 yards sometimes, but this one seems accurate almost to the foot. You can zoom in or out, and see the location in satellite or hybrid view instead of this street view. Satellite shows forest density, bodies of water, etc.; the hybrid view overlays that with the roads seen in this image, and is my favorite view. That's a thumbnail of the photo in question, btw.

If you click on the "here's the photo itself" link beneath the photo, you'll see a larger version of the picture itself. The little chain king was under one of the railroad ties at lower left in the photo.

cool, huh?!

here's the photo itself

Yes, virtually identical to what I was doing with a few capture sites too.

Ain't technology grand?..LOL!

thanks for sharing that, Terry

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

here's the satellite view in iPhoto, zoomed in a little.

Two corrections, for precision in these posts. It turns out I got a good geo-fix and tagged two pictures of the snake itself, after i carried it to my car, parked between the road and the RR tracks--just about where the pin is.

I hunted around for a while and then before leaving took the pic of the capture site itself--the RR track photo. I'd lost the geotag and didn't want to wait to get another one. So I later simply transferred the geotagging info from the snake pics to the collection site pics. So the location in the capture site photo is not as precise as i thought. But at least now i know why. And it's still very good, imho.

It was interesting to me, too, to look at the satellite view and see habitat features i wasn't aware of when i was hunting.

BTW, the satellite views are from Google, and may be several years old or more, I'm not sure how current Google keeps them.

Yes, that's the very same cool stuff I was doing..LOL!

Yes, the satellite images are a few years old, you could imagine how this would jeopardize world security, etc.. if every Joe-blow could zero in on anything he/she wished to in real-time..LOL!

You could do some real crimes of the century that way too.

Terrorists would also have a "field-day" with it!

I can still see my truck parked at the house I used to live in several years ago..LOL!

~Doug

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

>>Yes, that's the very same cool stuff I was doing..LOL!
>>
>> Yes, the satellite images are a few years old, you could imagine how this would jeopardize world security, etc.. if every Joe-blow could zero in on anything he/she wished to in real-time..LOL!
>>
>> You could do some real crimes of the century that way too.
>>
>> Terrorists would also have a "field-day" with it!
>>
>> I can still see my truck parked at the house I used to live in several years ago..LOL!
>>
>>
>> ~Doug
>>
>>
>> ~Doug
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>>"Better to be silent and thought a fool, than to open mouth and remove any doubt!"

well it is really cool the down side i see is giving up sacred spots. we all have had spots that have been trashed and cleaned out by commercial collectors, havnt we? i know i have. it is cool to share with some but i would be very hesitant to just post it for anyone to see and find.
,,,,,,,,thomas davis
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Morphs... just like baseball cards BUT ALIVE, how cool is that???

my website www.barmollysplace.com

you're right, thomas. and lindsay pike also pointed out geotagged photos could be used as evidence of collection of protected species, or of collection in protected areas. that's just me. So some might say, turn off your geotagging in those circumstances. But doesn't that sound like the Acorn scandal of the past few days, advising how to circumvent the law? I view it instead like redlight cameras--do the deed, take the heat.

i thought i'd posted this earlier but don't see it here so i might have screwed up a post. sorry.

terry i dont understand your post at all??? perhaps i dont understand geotagging either?!? i just was saying i wouldnt post my fav.snake hunts to the www for fear of commercial collectors cleaning them out. i dont hunt in protected areas or protected species so???
also are you saying you like or agree with these traffic cameras everywhere? your post was very confusing?
,,,,,,,,,thomas davis
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Morphs... just like baseball cards BUT ALIVE, how cool is that???

my website www.barmollysplace.com

Traffic cameras are a terrible idea. There are now traffic cameras in some places in the United States that aren't just fixed in place to aim at the traffic, they are now remote control and can be aimed at other places such as houses and buildings near the road.
They are basicly setting up an infrastructure that could be easily converted to use for monitoring the public, quelching political demonstrations, identifying houses where people meet, etc. I'm not saying that's the current intent but once the infrastructure is there it will be very tempting(and very easy) for it to be put into use.

n/p
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Morphs... just like baseball cards BUT ALIVE, how cool is that???

my website www.barmollysplace.com

NP
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www.Bluerosy.com

>>terry i dont understand your post at all???

I don't blame you thomas, i re-read it and it's pretty poorly written. I think my points were that geotagged photos...
1) could reveal, as you pointed out, favorite and better-kept-hidden collecting or observing sites
2) could, if shared, be evidence that someone collected something in a protected area.
3) as for the redlight cameras, i don't share some people's concerns about possible mis-use. It's my opinion it shouldn't matter whether you're speeding or running a red light and are ticketed because a policeman saw your offense because he was standing on the corner or driving behind you, OR saw your offense in a photo. My opinion's probably shaped by a career as a reporter, especially in the early years as a police reporter, where i saw a lot of bad accidents with horrible consequences, the result of speeding or redlight running or dui or some combination of those. Just mho.

peace
terry
ps: tried to post this earlier in the day but the post didn't seem to appear, so i'm trying again.

Most red light cameras are fixed in place and aim only at the intersection. They simply take a photo of the car as they go through, but many of these are being replaced with cameras that can swivel to be pointed at surrounding areas, houses, sidewalks, public squares.
It's these that we should be worried about as they are an infrastructure that can easily be converted to monitor all activies in the area, even into private homes.

I have to admit I had never seen that range map before. Not into range maps or localitys. I assumed all were Easterns around Gwinnett County since all I ever saw were classic Eastern kings as far as looks. The alb in question I saw was a very skinny 2 1/2 to 3 foot snake that was very wild caught looking as far as body weight and girth except it was a little skinny. It appeared very Eastern in appearance but as we know that isn't a full adult size and it could have changed some as it grew. The person who ended up getting it from the pet store was a wholesaler with an actual business in a warehouse that also sold fish in Atlanta if that helps. I won't say his name since I never say him trade for it or saw it after the pet shop had it and what they did or didn't do as far as a trade is hearsay.

Hubb's map is a little different from the one I referred to when I posted the pic of the western Surry Co. king. His map puts this guy less than 5 mi from the zone intergradation. Here is a king from southern Surry Co...more "typical" looking E. King.

That is a sweet looking one indeed!

Thanks for posting that pic.

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

It's been mentioned here how Chattanooga might have been mistaken for Chattooga, as in the river on the state line that would be in the Lgg range on Brian's range map.

The flooding the past few days in north Georgia has reminded me there's another "Chatta....." -- the Chattahoochee River. Instead of possibly violating Wikipedia's copyright rights, by posting its map here, I'll link instead to Wikipedia. It's got a nice map showing the river flows from northeast to southwest georgia, potentially running from very near Lgg range through the intergrade zone and subsequently through a lot of nigra range.

None of the early oral histories of the albino "eastern" king in question mentioned the Chattahoochee, but none mentioned the Chattooga, either. Once more, we conclude we'll probably never know the precise origins. People's opinions on the ssp of origin will probably need to depend on the first animal's appearance and kevin's having gotten it from the same fella who sold him normal looking easterns in the past, and kevin's account of comparing the first one to easterns and concluding they were the same. It's circumstantial and probably (I'm saying that a lot here!) the best we can do.
Wikipedia on Chattahoochee, including map

>>I WROTE: "... a nice map showing the (chattahoochee) river flows from northeast to southwest georgia, potentially running from very near Lgg range through the intergrade zone and subsequently through a lot of nigra range. "

MY INTERPRETATION WAS WRONG, AND THAT LED TO A WRONG CONCLUSION:

If you compare the wikipedia map with the hubbs range map you'll see the chattahoochee starts in or near Lgg range, runs for a while thru the intergrade zone and then returns to eastern king range for the balance of its flow (and the majority of its length).

So despite what i wrote in the post immediately above this, if it was the Chattahoochee that was mentioned as the river bank where the original albino king was found, it's most likely it was Lgg. Since we can't KNOW the answer, and are only trying to interpret clues here, i'd say given the magnitude of difference in length of the Chattahoochee vs the Chattooga, and the fact the former's in better collecting area than the latter, those clues point to the former and thus Lgg.

But let me be the first to acknowledge that's circumstantial evidence.

AAAWWW!!,...GEEEEZZ!!,...ARRRRGGH!!, WTF!!!!, so NOW ya' tell us!

LOL!!,..goofin' with ya, of course..HAHAHA!!

~Doug

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