Reptile & Amphibian Forums

My aunt found this little guy searching for mice in her kitchen and called me before beating it with a broom, thank God she did, it's a cool little desert x speckled kingsnake.

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Dustin Smith

>>My aunt found this little guy searching for mice in her kitchen and called me before beating it with a broom, thank God she did, it's a cool little desert x speckled kingsnake.

Way more Holbrooki than Splendida......
Very nice.....Looks like a female too....
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John Lassiter
Poor planning and procrastination on your part does not constitute an emergency on my part...
www.coastalbendcaptivebreeding.com

What makes you call it an integrade? I have seen similar holbrooki to that before. Is it a range thing you are referring too?? Just curious.

KevinM

Yes a range thing, I'm in the dead center of Texas. The holbrooki I have found in these parts have all had nice even speckling. So I figured it was an intergrade. Unless it is a "locality" holbrooki, it was found 15 miles from where I normally find speckleds.
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Dustin Smith

Heres the holbrooki I normally find where I herp

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Dustin Smith

>>Heres the holbrooki I normally find where I herp

Here are some holbrooki with no splendida influence......
Some have dorsal crossbars.....some do not......




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John Lassiter
Poor planning and procrastination on your part does not constitute an emergency on my part...
www.coastalbendcaptivebreeding.com

What do you think?

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Dustin Smith

Something about it just says holbrooki to me. They are not all clean and evenly speckled, even in the same area. I think our views on subspecies pattern and coloration get skewed with some of these animals based on the "best of the best" we see in field guides, mags, etc. Not saying it doesnt have splendida influence, but it wouldnt surprise me to find a speck like that here in LA, smack dab in holbrooki territory for sure. Regardless, interesting looking snake for sure!!!

That one definitely looks more of a dark holbrooki phenotype, but I don't see any splendida influence there at all. I don't know where it was captured, but if it had any other ssp in it's lineage, it would have to be The Black king(nigra). That looks like a very typical look many of the nigra x holbrooki intergrades have that I have seen.

What county exactly was it captured in?

Anyway though, nice snake for sure, but it doesn't display any splendida influece in my opinion at all. Speck, or speck x nigra is what I see.

nice find BTW!!

~Doug
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"a snake in the grass is a GOOD thing"

my website -serpentinespecialties.webs.com

Bell county, and I don't think there are any black kings around here
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Dustin Smith

Yes, you are 100% correct about there not being any nigra anywhere CLOSE to that area. I didn't catch the fact that it was from central Texas earlier.

What is VERY interesting here is that on good range maps I have here show Bell county being perfectly devided down the center with Speckled/Desert intergrades ending their range to the left side of the county, and 100% pure holbrooki starting to the right of the county and well beyond that for hundreds of miles..LOL!

The important thing to keep in mind here is that the extreme left side of Bell county is the absolute utmost farthest point possible of the HUGE intergrade zone, then it is ALL pure holbrooki for many hundreds of miles from that point on to the east of the county.

So basically, it would be considered a holbrooki, but "could" certainly have a smaller diluted percentage of splendida in its genetic lineage.

cool find there!

~Doug
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"a snake in the grass is a GOOD thing"

my website -serpentinespecialties.webs.com

lol, that snake is a king snake, getula, catch a splendida there and you can call it what you want. how about a belly shot?

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Todd Hughes

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"a snake in the grass is a GOOD thing"

my website -serpentinespecialties.webs.com

And you think the snakes can read range maps???????
LOL!!!!!!!!!!!!

That magic line on the maps aren't definite......

It looks Holbrooki to me......
Or if I were a true splitter....something even different than Holbrooki or Splendida.......LOL
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John Lassiter
Poor planning and procrastination on your part does not constitute an emergency on my part...
www.coastalbendcaptivebreeding.com

there ya go! It is what it is...I don't know anymore, I see so many things from the "intergrade zone leaning both ways. The lines are definitely getting more blurry. I am even thinking that there is a western form, a central form, a southern form and an eastern form, all with many different types.
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Todd Hughes

C'mon man!, I realize the defined line on a map can be nothing more than a VERY generalized idea of what types are where. The point is that not far to the right for hundreds of miles are more typical holbrooki phenotypes, and over further to the left of the county and beyond are more intergrade types, THEN beyond that are more classic splendida. I also fully understand that different percentages of phenotypic "looks" can be under the same nearby log or rock or whatever too.

The different looks have to start gradually changing somewhere at some point, I was merely pointing out that it is a very tough call to say it is definitely any specific one or the other given that general location.

Like I said before, looks like a dark Speck more than anything to me.

Same as if I caught a king on the east coast of central Florida here, I would sure as heck know it isn't an Eastern!

~Doug
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"a snake in the grass is a GOOD thing"

my website -serpentinespecialties.webs.com

>>C'mon man!, I realize the defined line on a map can be nothing more than a VERY generalized idea of what types are where. The point is that not far to the right for hundreds of miles are more typical holbrooki phenotypes, and over further to the left of the county and beyond are more intergrade types, THEN beyond that are more classic splendida. I also fully understand that different percentages of phenotypic "looks" can be under the same nearby log or rock or whatever too.

LOL.....Why are you saying right and left? Your left or my left???????? I'm confused......Heheheheehehe

Don't you mean North or Northeast and West or Southwest??????

Maybe you have the map upside down Doug......J/K man.....
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John Lassiter
Poor planning and procrastination on your part does not constitute an emergency on my part...
www.coastalbendcaptivebreeding.com

Yeah, very true, I was using the left/right thing from looking at the U.S. straight-on, and from where I am in Florida..LOL!

~Doug
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"a snake in the grass is a GOOD thing"

my website -serpentinespecialties.webs.com