I am with you... I did not put anyone down for their guesses and in fact was only taking my best shot at an ID.

I am not sure where you heard that the "faces" are not diagnostic. The rostral scute is very diagnostic with regards to this sorting out various members of this Genus.

I sound like a broken record but will say it again..... go get Stull's publication on this Genus. There are no pretty pictures and it is a scientific work but if the reader takes the time to study it they will get a very good working knowledge regarding the relationships between the recognized taxa of this Genus.... It really is a Must for anyone who is interested in Pituophis. $24 on Amazon right now!

I hope that my previous post communicated one thing above all.... and that is the difficulty in distinguishing various ssp. of Pituophis without locality info.


I have a pic some where that a friend sent me of a snake seen on the Arizona Strip ( a bit of land north of the Grand Canyon). The snake is very affinisXdeserticola looking. It does not look like either ssp. and w/o locality info it would be tough to ID to ssp. I can't find the picture but will continue to look...

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