Locality CA kingsnakes

[RossCA]

This year I paired up 5 of my locality CA king females. At the moment I have 4 different locales, but only bred 2 of them this year. One of the locales are a trio of wild caught "Grease kings" from the famous Long Beach field. Well, famous to the locals of Southern CA. The other locale is from West Los Angeles, which has become famous in the past several years for producing 3 different genetic morphs. I bred all 3 of those morphs this year.

I will start of with the now famous oil field in Long Beach CA, which is known for producing hypermelanistic kings. A lot of people consider these kings ugly, by cal king standards, but what makes these desirable is the fact they are a rarely seen morph in the wild and only found at a few locales in LA and Orange Co., because of the limited amount of habitat left in one of the most populated areas in the country. One particular oil field in Long Beach has produced many hypermelanistic kings in the past and has become well known through word of mouth, which I'm sure was not intended by the guys the first laid boards out in that field, but they just had to show their friends, and you know what that leads to. Everybody and their mom visiting the field on a regular basis. lol I can't blame them, though, there is something very special about finding snakes in a small area set aside and protected from development in the middle of a huge city. Recently they have started making big changes in this field. They have torn down old abandon buildings, and cleared out huge areas that were cemented. They also appear to be making a park and planted a community garden where I found my first Cal king there. I have no idea what is in store for this area, but it looks like it will soon be cut down to a much smaller size, or be developed completely.

An areal view. You can see boards spread out everywhere.

lbc by RossAZ480, on Flickr

Recently me and my friend visited the oil field, and many of the boards that were once there, are now gone for one reason or another. The covered on big area with compose and one area is now a fenced in garden where I found my first hypermelanistic kingsnake.

Photo-0718 by RossAZ480, on Flickr

Here's the first hypermelanistic king I found in 2006. This is a male.

Grease king by RossAZ480, on Flickr

I bred him this year to this female I found in 2006. As you can see, she looks quite different from the male. The top part of her light bands have darkened considerably as soon as she matured. Both were found as babies.


Here they are paired up this spring.

Grease kings by RossAZ480, on Flickr

The female gravid and ready to pop. lol

IMG_7663 by RossAZ480, on Flickr

After 40 days she laid 9 eggs.

IMG_7675 by RossAZ480, on Flickr

I also bred the male to a wild caught female my friend found and gave to me. She is not considered hypermelanistic by most herpers that have hunted that field, but her head pattern is darker than your normal king.

[RossCA]

Here they are paired up. They were only locked up one hour the first time, so the next day I put them together again and they locked up for several hours. This is the only pair I put together two times.

IMG_7618 by RossAZ480, on Flickr


IMG_7620 by RossAZ480, on Flickr

32 days later she laid 5 eggs.

IMG_7677 by RossAZ480, on Flickr

This is getting long, so I will add the other photos later.

[Snakefood]

Nice, I think they are very nice looking!! I hope your hatch rates are good.

[snake man12]

Nice kings. That is pretty cool about all the different locales

[RossCA]

Thanks guys. I will get the rest up soon.

[RossCA]

The West Los Angeles local, IMO, is the most amazing locale for Cal kings. 3 basic morphs can be found there, including a double homozygote, and an aberrant form of one of the morphs. This may be the last place all these different morphs occur. None of them are easily found either. Here are the different morphs found there:

Newport This morph typically has a stripe down its back with aberrant markings on its side. About 10% of the population are Newports. Co-dominant.

Newport "Scrambled banded" morph This is an aberrant form of the Newport. A really good example that has more than 75% scrambled banding, probably only makes up 1% of the overall population. Co-dominant.

Long Beach hypermelanistic morph This is the same morph found in Long Beach, except it is much harder to find. It makes up about 3% of the population. Co-dominant.

Hypermelanistic Newport Also known as the "Mud" morph in Brian Hubbs book on Common kingsnakes. This is a double homozygous morph expressing hypermelanism and Newport at the same time. These make up about 3% of the population. Co-dominant.

Striped Mud morph Not related at all to the "Mud" morph, this is actually a Whittier aberrant morph. Only 3 have been found in the wild, that are known, and all came from this area. These are less than 1% of the population. Recessive.

I found this male Newport Scrambled banded morph in 2006. I've bred him a few times in the past and so far he has only produced one other Scrambled banded Newport. When I get Newports from him, they are normally typical with a stripe running down their back. That explains why this aberrant morph is so rare in the wild. My goal is to produce another one to hold back.

California kingsnake (Newport Scrambled banded morph) by RossAZ480, on Flickr

This year I bred him to two different females. This first one is a typical banded female I found at the same locale.

IMG_7635 by RossAZ480, on Flickr

25 days later, she laid 6 eggs.

IMG_7669 by RossAZ480, on Flickr

The other female I bred him to was this f1 (first generation from wild caught) captive bred Striped Mud morph. This snake was given to me by Don Huffman, who is the first known guy to find this morph in the wild.

F1 Striped Mud morph (aberrant Whitier morph) by RossAZ480, on Flickr


F1 Striped Mud morph (aberrant Whitier morph) by RossAZ480, on Flickr


IMG_7611 by RossAZ480, on Flickr


Striped Mud X Scrambled banded Newport by RossAZ480, on Flickr

Gravid.

IMG_7653 by RossAZ480, on Flickr

[RossCA]

31 days later she laid 12 eggs.

IMG_7678 by RossAZ480, on Flickr

[RossCA]

The last pair was a Newport Scrambled banded female and Long Beach hypermelanistic morph. Here is the hyper I found in 2006.

Long Beach hypermelanistic CA kingsnake by RossAZ480, on Flickr


Long Beach hypermelanistic CA kingsnake by RossAZ480, on Flickr

And here's the female. I produced her in 2006 from a pair of wild caught kings from this locale. The father was a Newport that looked in between a typical and scrambled banded Newport.



IMG_7632 by RossAZ480, on Flickr


IMG_7627 by RossAZ480, on Flickr

And 25 days later, she laid 5 eggs.

IMG_7673 by RossAZ480, on Flickr

Here's some shots of this locale.

Los Angeles Co. by RossAZ480, on Flickr


Los Angeles Co. by RossAZ480, on Flickr

[Kettennatter]

Wonderful. I used to live in CA but back then I never had an appreciation for king snakes and their variation by locale. Thanks for showing us.

[Jlassiter]

Awesome posts Ross.......can't wait to see some babies...
Love those grease kings the most......

[RossCA]

Thanks a lot, guys! Glad you liked it.

[TremTricolors]

Ross, Great post....Locality, Locality, Locality......Love it! Are all the offspring spoken for already? Make sure you post some pics of them pipping!

[RossCA]

Thanks a lot, man! Yeah, they and next years are pretty much spoken for. I will definitely share the results.

[Will0W783]

That was a great read, really cool information. Thanks for posting that!
I really like the Newport scrambled banded male you have- he's gorgeous!

[RossCA]

Thanks a lot, Kimberly! I really like his look too.