My new garter(s)

[ConcinusMan]

I don't think this latest one pictured is a concinnus. It looks like a WA or OR state T.s. fitchi to me. I suspected that first because of the color. Now looking at the light colored underside and well defined edge of the lateral stripe where it meets the black, I'm having doubts about both of them. I'm pretty darn sure the male is a fitchi, and the female could be one too.

The light undersides for one, isn't typical of a laterally striped concinnus. Neither is the well defined upper edge of the lateral stripe. Those are fitchi traits.

Let me show you another fitchi from Oregon:



And another:



See what I mean? Look at the sides and the color. Now look at another laterally striped concinnus from Clatsop county Oregon:


See the differences? Normally, range would tell you if it's a concinnus or a fitchi but since we don't know where they were found, those differences I just illustrated are how you tell the two apart (fitchi vs. concinnus). It's pretty common for people who don't know about the range of concinnus, to go find a fitchi in Oregon, and assume because it's from Oregon, and has red spots, it must be an oregon red spotted. Well, concinnus doesn't occur in the same areas as fitchi. Generally concinnus is confined to the Willamette Valley and SW WA. Fitchi is found in the rest of Oregon and eastern WA where concinnus does not occur.

Like I said, looking at the laterals and underside, I'm thinking they are both Valley garters. Laterally striped concinnus' do not have light undersides, (with the exception of the throat area) and the lateral stripes are usually a different color. Sort of bluish, and the edge isn't well defined.

With all that said, I think that Stefan was right all along. Those are fitchi laterals on both snakes. Unfortunately, I would say that there are also many fitchi/concinnus mixed breeds out there being sold as concinnus. I've seen plenty of "concinnus" for sale that sure do look like concinnus' but they aren't like any pure concinnus you can find in the wild.

[mikem]

See the differences? Normally, range would tell you if it's a concinnus or a fitchi but since we don't know where they were found, those differences I just illustrated are how you tell the two apart (fitchi vs. concinnus). It's pretty common for people who don't know about the range of concinnus, to go find a fitchi in Oregon, and assume because it's from Oregon, and has red spots, it must be an oregon red spotted. Well, concinnus doesn't occur in the same areas as fitchi. Generally concinnus is confined to the Willamette Valley and SW WA. Fitchi is found in the rest of Oregon and eastern WA where concinnus does not occur.

Like I said, looking at the laterals and underside, I'm thinking they are both Valley garters. Laterally striped concinnus' do not have light undersides, (with the exception of the throat area) and the lateral stripes are usually a different color. Sort of bluish, and the edge isn't well defined.

With all that said, I think that Stefan was right all along. Those are fitchi laterals on both snakes. Unfortunately, I would say that there are also many fitchi/concinnus mixed breeds out there being sold as concinnus. I've seen plenty of "concinnus" for sale that sure do look like concinnus' but they aren't like any pure concinnus you can find in the wild.

like i said in the original post, the vendor i purchased them from said they were indeed wild caught from oregon. he had another female, but i decided not to get her because she had some scarring and the last inch or so of her tail was missing. and since you said that concinnus and fitchi aren't in the same area, i don't think either would be mixed.

are you talking about people unintentionally breeding fitchi/concinnus' in captivity and selling them as "concinnus"? or do they share a range somewhere and may naturally intergrade?

[ConcinusMan]

are you talking about people unintentionally breeding fitchi/concinnus' in captivity and selling them as "concinnus"? or do they share a range somewhere and may naturally intergrade?

Yes to the first question. You can see how it was confusing to I.D. the snakes. If I knew exact location where it was found, I wouldn't have any trouble identifying them myself, but this wouldn't be the first, and won't be the last time I've seen snakes mislabeled or sold as concinnus when they weren't. These two species would readily interbreed in captivity. This leads me to believe that some concinnus' bred in captivity aren't necessarily pure and could have other similar subspecies in their bloodlines. Anyway, fitchi are very widespread in Oregon, including the desert climate east of the Cascade range, while concinnus' are confined to the NW portion of Oregon and the Willamette Valley. Fitchi just aren't found in that area. They prefer a drier climate such as eastern Oregon and WA where concinnus do not occur.

The Columbia River Gorge cuts a "path" of sorts through the cascade range. This creates a break in the mountain barrier. Travel from west to east (forest gives way to desert as you go east) through the gorge and there is small intergrade zone as you leave concinnus' range and begin to enter fitchi's range but the overlap area is very small. In the climate transition zone in the Gorge, sometimes you can find desert species farther west than they would normally occur.