1915.] NATURAL SCIENCES OF PHILADELPHIA. 167 



the whole, it may accord best with a sound method to take no note 

 of this form at its present stage." C. S. Brimley says that in his 

 experience "the normal formula is, scales in 19 rows, occasionally 

 17 or 21, one temporal in first row, occasionally two, and loreal 

 usually present, but sometimes absent on one or both sides. "^^ Only 

 in his Florida specimens were the scales in 17 rows. Like these, 

 our specimens have a greater reduction in number of scale rows 

 than Cope's material, the formulae being 17-15-15, 17-19-15, 17- 

 19-15, 17-19-17, 17-19-17, 17-19-17. This is a reduction far 

 beyond the 21 rows of Cope's and Brown's descriptions and if any- 

 thing below the better normal of Brimley. So, in this respect, our 

 specimens incline towards Osceola elapsoidea. Furthermore, only 

 in the specimen (No. 6,100) with this reduction carried farthest 

 (17-15-15) do we have the loreals of both sides absent, but it is one 

 of the largest of the six specimens'. In this individual the prefrontal 

 has descended to the level of the labial and in the forms (Lv d. coccin- 

 eus) with loreals these plates must be derived from the prefrontal. 

 In No. 6,242 the loreal is very small and linear, while in No. 6,240 

 it is normal and quadrangular on one side and triangular on the 

 other, the apex not even touching the preocular. In 3 specimens 

 (Nos. 6,101 the smallest, 6,241, 6,249 the largest) the loreal is present 

 on both sides and a prominent quadrangular plate from the pre- 

 ocular to the nasal. 



Habits. — This species is more or less of a burrower, but a glance 

 at some of the largest specimens suggests Elaphe snakes in their 

 compressed deep bodies with sides sharply defined from the venter 

 by a ridge. Such elaphine snakes climb well and of such evidence 

 in L. d. coccineus we have only the capture of a snake taken June 6, 

 1912. It was found on one of the frames of an old building, the 

 snake being 31-4 feet above the ground. 



Food. — In food habits this species is more or less of a constrictor. 

 It feeds on ground lizards, skinks, swifts and other snakes and 

 insects. In the stomach of No. 6,242 we found an angleworm and 

 the remains of two killifishes, suggesting more of any aquatic nature 

 than usually ascribed, but after every rain Billy's Island is covered 

 with little water pools containing fish which as evaporation goes on 

 become stranded. Such Avould be easy of capture. Our specimens 

 yielded no clue to the oviparity or breeding of this species. 



33 Brimley, C. S. Notes on the Scutellation of the Red King Snake, Ophibolus 

 doliatus coccineus Schlegel, Jour. Elisha Mitchell Soc, XXI, No. 4, December, 

 190.5, pp. 14.5-148. 



