Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I've had these pictures for quite a while but have never gotten around to posting them here on the forum. All but one are kings I found in the wild here in Southern California. The names I will use to describe them are the names found in Brian Hubbs book on common Kingsnakes.

First off is this normal Cal king from Orange Co.

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Here is an adult from the same County.

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Here is a Typical striped Newport-Long Beach Morph also from Orange Co. About one in 10 or 15 are Newports in this county.

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A fairly wide banded juvenile from San Diego County.

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My first striped king from San Diego County.

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A hypomelanistic Cal king from S.D. Co. This is my coolest find from this county. The head pattern was pretty exceptional as well.

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A couple of normal juvenile Cal kings from Riverside Co.

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A normal adult.

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A couple of typical striped kingsnakes from Riverside County. There is a lot of variation in the stripers from this county.

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This striper has an exceptional amount of yellow/aberrancies high up on the sides. This one is considered very rare for Riverside County.

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A Riverside Dotted morph. This one is also a rare find for the area. My first in 11 years at one particular board line.

About 75% of the belly was solid brown. Brown bellies are very uncommon here.

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A Newport-Long Beach Barred Morph from Riverside. These are rarely found in pure form. Normally there would be more dots and partial striping. I consider this a very good find.

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I looked at every single one there Ross, and you found some absolutely OUTSTANDING specimens!!

Not only that, your photography and "in-situ" displays were just fabulous bud!

thanks for sharing that great post!

BTW, I could relate to all those phenotypes you posted from Hubbs' book descriptions, so it made it even that much more fun to see all those that you pictured that are so similar.

thanks again!

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

my website -serpentinespecialties.webs.com

Thanks a lot, Doug. I never shared my finds mostly because of how East coast biased this forum is, but today I was like "what the heck". lol It was actually Hubbs book before he published it that really helped me in finding all these different types of kings. We would talk long hours on the phone and he would describe what he was putting in the book. I try to thank him publicly every chance I get. Thanks again, it was fun putting together for everyone.
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Yeah, Hubbs sure knows about those Cal. kings, that is for sure!, and it looks like you used alot of your conversation with him to your advantage with finding many of those nice specimens too.

With over 2,000 personal captures under his belt, he has certainly seen a few natural variants in his day..LOL!

He and I were laughing our butts off at Daytona last year about all sorts of things, it was great!

anyway, yeah, your post was a real nice one Ross!

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

my website -serpentinespecialties.webs.com

Again Ross, WHAT AN AWESOME POST! Thank you Thank you for doing all that work to educate and delight us on here. I am from the East Coast, born outside of Philly on the Main Line, and now live in Charlotte, NC. Was not really a Cal King fan until I was given a nice Coastal Cal, and now I love 'em. Very nice animals you chose to photo as well.

Best wishes, and hope to see more of your pics again. Hubb's book and your pics make Cal Kings make much more sense to me now!

Alex
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BULLS: Pr normal (KS&TX), 1 Pr Northern (M Medicine Hat, Alberta, Canada & F Minn), Pr Kankakee Co, Ill, CORNS: Pr Okeetee, SC, FOXES: Pr Western, KINGS: Pr Black Eastern (L.g.nigra) Todd Co. KY, Pr. NC Eastern Chains (M from Union Co. & F from Mecklenburg Co.), Pr."Goini", Franklin Co. Fla, Pr. Costal Banded Cal (M Hypo & F normal) Pr Speckled, Harris Co. TX, PINES: Pr Louisiana (pure descendants of Terry Vandeventer stock), Pr Southern (F light phase & M- Aiken, SC), PYTHONS: Pr normal Ball, RATS: Pr Black, Henderson Co. NC, Pr Black (M White Side & F Leucistic), Western Green, F (Mt. Hopkins, Cochise Co. AZ), OTHERS: 10 Tarantulas, 150 Orchid plants, 40 assorted tropical plants and violets, 3 Freshwater Planted Aquariums with West African Dwarf Cichlids and 2 condo-porch gardens with Bonsai, Roses and etc...

Glad you liked it, Alex. Yeah, Hubbs book shows just about every morph found in the wild. Its enough to really motivate us into getting out there and finding them.
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elf..

Fantastic pictorial! Love it.

Very interesting about the pattern aberrancies occuring in Riverside. I've seen a number of Cals there, never fortunate enough to see one of those. Very cool.
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Mark

Thanks, Mark. It just takes some time and luck to start finding the odd balls.
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