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I went on a call saturday to a house where the family reported their dog was bitten by a snake. When I got to the house, I found the fattest southern pacific rattler I have ever seen. It was super agitated and appears to be either obese or pregnant? I would guess pregnant. I also have never encountered a southern pacific as agitated as this one. The whole time it was in the box that I was removing it with, it never stopped rattling.
When I finally released it and went back to my car, it was still rattling. I was over a hundred feet away and could still hear it going nuts.
I think its still a little soon to be seeing such gravid rattlers but I guess anything is possible.
please give me your thoughts.
Jason Mc

She looks gravid to me as well. It's not uncommon to see gravid females this time of year.

The pic almost looks like a speckled rattler. Location will tell if it is possible. If it is a speck, that will explain the real bad attitude. Specks are nuts.
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Mark

It looked like a helleri to me, but I could be wrong. It was caught at the top of vanalden in tarzana southern california. Tarzana is in the santa monica mountain range. As I said before, the temper was insane. I even struck at me twice after it was let go. Most southern pacifics are mellow and leave with no hassel after the release.
Please correct me if I am wrong.
Thanks
Jason Mc

You are correct in your id of this snake. It's a C.o.helleri for sure. Like any species of snake, you will find some real mellow animals and occationally find some in a bad mood too. I think she is just wanting to get to a safe spot to cook her babies.

>>>>>You are correct in your id of this snake. It's a C.o.helleri for sure. Like any species of snake, you will find some real mellow animals and occationally find some in a bad mood too. I think she is just wanting to get to a safe spot to cook her babies.>>>>>>

Last I checked S. pacifics were still C.viridis helleri...by C.o.helleri do you mean C.oreganus helleri? I know that the taxonomy on a number of crotalid species was changing, but I'm unsure of what changed...

AP

SSAR is recognizing two different species in the former viridis complex. C. viridis with two subs (nominate and nuntius) and C. oreganus with everything else falling into a sub of this species.

This is just a conservative approach for the time. In the long run it looks very likely that nuntius will be found to be a synonym of viridis and sunk, and that caliginis will be considered an island pop. of helleri. Actually they have already been found to be invalid but like I said, SSAR is being cautious in their acceptence.

Cerberus will probably be elevated to a full species as it really is not part of the oreganus clade and is much older than oreganus. Three different DNA studies all agree that cerberus and viridis branched off of a common ancestor and went separate ways. Cerberus settled in Az. Viridis moved north and west. Oreganus then branched off of viridis in the Northwest U.S. and then migrated back south with the other subs forming along the way.

..see Rich's post for details.

the viridis complex is now
C.viridis viridis
C.v.nuntius

And all former viridis ssp. are now
C.oreganus sp.

And the AZ black is or will be
C.cerebrus

Is that about right?

I hate it when taxon changes behind my back...

AP

It should be interesting to see how long it takes for cerberus to be elevated to species status. Actually it was published a while ago in Biology of the viper and Douglas et al. actually have elevated all oreganus ssp to species status. SSAR chose to be conservative and just recognize the two species for now.

other changes:

C.totonacus
C.ravus (used to be sistrurus)
The central american durissus subs have all been placed into Crotalus simus (simus, culminatus, tzabcan) the S. american snakes are still durissus.

In the oreganus complex there are some very problematic forms hidden in populations of lutosus, oreganus and abyssus that could emerge as new subspecies.

I hear S.catenatus will be broken into two species:
S.catenatus
S.tergeminus (tergeminus, edwardsi)

and also possible reclassification of the lepidus complex and C. triseriatus.

So many changes! Sisturus will now be merged with Crotalus??????? It's gonna be like learning the taxon from the beginning...I need to get an updated book, there is no way I'm gonna be able to absorb all this in one sitting

AP

recent DNA work have shown it to much more closely related to C. triseriatus than to S. catenatus or S. miliarius.

Weve been finding snakes since early March, and they may have been out before that. Im sure thats plenty of time to reach that stage. Also, Ive encounted bad tempered helleris. Ive always heard that they are bad tempered.

Santa Monica Mtns = helleri alright. That specimen is impressive.