35. CONTIAS6. RHINOCHEILVS 773 



Distribution. This harmless little snake occurs prin- 

 cipally in the transition zone, overlapping into the adjoining 

 zones. It has been recorded from Puget Sound, Washing- 

 ton, and from Oregon, but no specimens have been collected 

 in these states in recent years. Boulenger records one from 

 Vancouver Island, B. C. 



In California it occurs in the Sierra Nevada and coast 

 ranges. So far as I know, it has not been taken south of 

 Tulare and Monterey counties. The counties in which it 

 has been collected are Tulare (Kaweah at 1,000 feet), Fresno 

 ([mountains near] Fresno), Amador (five miles east from 

 Carbondale), El Dorado (Fyffe), Butte, Shasta (Baird), 

 Humboldt (Carlotta), Mendocino (Eel River Bridge, 

 Comptche), Sonoma (Petaluma, Agua Caliente), Napa (St. 

 Helena), Marin, Alameda (Berkeley, Piedmont, Alameda, 

 Haywards), San Mateo (Menlo Park, Woodside, La Hon- 

 da, Pcscadero Creek), Santa Clara (Palo Alto, Stanford 

 University, Phelps Lake, San Jose), Santa Cruz (Big Basin, 

 Wrights), and Monterey (Carmel). 



Genus 36. Rhinocheilus 



RhmochMus BAIRD & GIRARD, N. Amer. Rept., Pt. I, Serp., 1853, p. 120 

 (type, lecontei); COPE, Report U. S. Nat. Mas. for 1898, 1900, 

 p. 930. 



The body is rather slender, with short, tapering tail. 

 The head is slightly distinct from the neck, and ends in a 

 narrow snout which projects far beyond the lower jaw. The 

 head plates are normal. The nasal plates rarely unite 

 above the nostril. One (or two) preoculars and two (or 

 three) postoculars are present, as is also a small loreal. 

 Temporals are normally two followed by three. The scales 

 are smooth, in seventeen to twenty-five rows, with apical 

 pits. The anal plate is divided. Urosteges are in one series, 



