238 THE AMERICAN MIDLAND NATURALIST 



markings of insularum is attracting the attention of several students, and we 

 soon may have detailed statistics available upon the populations from several 

 of the islands. 



Storeria dekayi dekayi X rvr'tghtorum 



Dekay's Snake 



(Page 88; maps 20 and 57; plate 12, fig. I) 



Trapido (1944) divided Storeria dekayi into a half dozen subspecies, three 

 of which occur in the United States. These latter, with their approximate 

 ranges (as defined by Trapido) are as follows: (1) S. d. dekayi — the North- 

 east, from eastern Ohio and Virginia eastward and northward to Maine and 

 southeastern Quebec; (2) S. d. wrightorum — the Midwest and South, from 

 southern Wisconsin to Louisiana and eastward (in the south) to South Caro- 

 lina, Georgia, and the Florida panhandle; and (3) S. d. texana — southern 

 Minnesota to southern Texas. On his distribution map {loc. cit., p. 54), 

 Trapido shows broad areas of intergradation between the adjacent races; the 

 western half of Ohio is marked to indicate intergradation between dekayi and 

 wrightorum. 



In attempting to evaluate Trapido's conclusions, two important facts must 

 be borne in mind. First, he saw only a meagre sixteen specimens from Ohio, 

 half of which he listed as dekayi and half as wrightorum. Obviously, he 

 either ignored or overlooked the many snakes of this species in the collections 

 at the Toledo Zoo and the Ohio State Museum. Second, each individual 

 specimen is identified in his text as either dekayi or wrightorum without regard 

 to geographical distribution. No intergrades are designated nor is an inter- 

 grading population defined. (See comments upon the "new systematics" on 

 page 222.) He lists S. d. dekayi from as far west as Lucas County, Ohio, 

 although his map indicates that this form does not extend farther westward 

 than the center of the state. (Trapido also lists S. d. wrightorum from west- 

 ern Pennsylvania and east central West Virginia, even though the localitie"> 

 in those states are one hundred and fifty miles farther east than the area of 

 intergradation between dekayi and wrightorum shown on his map ) 



It IS rather apparent that Storeria dekayi (in Ohio at least) is in need of 

 further study. 



In describing wrightorum, Trapido distinguished it from the subspeci's 

 dekayi on the basis of two characters: (1) the dorsal spots, which normally 

 are present in dekayi, are fused across the center of the back in wrightorum to 

 form short crossbars; and (2) the sum of the vcntrals and subcaudals is 176 

 or more in wrightorum and 175 or less in dekayi. 



I have recently examined (or re-examined) one hundred and thirty-six 

 Ohio specimens, checking carefully upon these two characters. Some of the 

 snakes, of course, are of little or no value for this purpose. Those with tnm- 

 cated tails are useless for m^aking the necessary scale counts, and several juve- 

 niles, plus a few adults that have been badly stained by formalin, have the 

 dorsal pattern quite obscure. In some, one character could be determined but 

 not the other. In order to check upon the relative abundance of the charac- 



