Black & White Banded Snake, July 18, 2008, Houston, TX  pg. 3

The midbody scales, enlarged in the photo on the right, show several interesting features, too. Again, the quality of the image is so poor that I have to guess about a few things, but the image is helpful anyway. For example, the scales appear unkeeled or only weakly keeled. The spine appears to be delineated, on the left half of the midbody section portrayed in the photo, by a faint line along the top of the body. Counting the white bands from the left, look at the second one: the spine is marked by a line separating the darker (shadowed) left half from the brighter right half. Count the scales down the side of the bright half. I  have to squint to see them, but they're faintly visible. I count nine, possibly ten, rows, including the spinal row itself, but I may be missing the last (10th or 11th) row next to the belly scale. That, added to eight to ten rows on the other side, makes a total of 17- 21 rows of scales at midbody. Seventeen of seventy two (24%) native Texas snake species [Werler & Dixon] have smooth or weakly keeled scales in 17-21 rows at midbody, so this measure narrows our search. By the way, the Texas coral snake has 15 rows eof scales at midbody. I will continue to research this snake, but please, if you have any ideas, share them with me. Click here to read the comments I've received.

Page  1  *  2  *  3  *  4  * SNAKE ENCOUNTERS

* TERMITE ENCOUNTERS  *  SNAKE ENCOUNTERS * SNAKE BITE FIRST AID * SNAKE EXCLUSION * SPIDER ENCOUNTERS FOR 2008 *  SPIDER ENCOUNTERS FOR 2007 * SPIDER BITE FIRST AID * SPIDER EXTERMINATION * PUSS CATERPILLAR ENCOUNTERS * PUSS CATERPILLAR FIRST AID * PUSS CATERPILLAR EXTERMINATION *  Assembled & Edited by Jerry Cates. Questions? Corrections? Comments? BUG ME RIGHT NOW! ---- Ph: 512-331-1111 ---- E-Mail ---- Privacy ----BugsInTheNews * --0a0s--