BEVISION OF THE KING SNAKES. 191 



0.100 to 0.155 of the total length (males average about 0.135 and 

 females about 0.130). 



Pattern: From head to tip of tail, 28 to 62 dorsal blotches or sad- 

 dles of brown, gray, or red (young and some adults), extending down on 

 the sides as far as to the fifth to second rows of scales. These blotches 

 are narrowly edged with black, and set on a ground color of whitish, 

 yellowish or grayish, minutely mottled with darker. On the sides, 

 alternating with the dorsal blotches, one or two series of roundish 

 spots, the upper row brown edged with black, the lower mostly 

 black; belly checked with black and white, sometimes suffused with 

 red; on back of head (fig. 54) usually a Y-shaped or oval spot of 

 white; from the side of the neck forward over the eye, a white band, 

 meeting its fellow across the frontal plate; a black band from the 

 eye to the angle of the mouth. 



Typical individuals from the northern portion of the range may 

 be described as follows: Body above with 45 to 60 squarish brown 



Pig. 54.— Lampropeltis Triangulum Triangulum (Acad. Phila., no. 3621, from Belmont, Phila- 

 delphia, Pennsylvania). About IJ x nat. size. Showing typical pattern of anterior end ot 



BOOT, 



blotches, narrowly edged with black, that extend down on the sides 

 to the fifth row of scales; on each side just below the dorsal blotches 

 is a series of roundish spots, also edged with black, that alternate 

 with the dorsal blotches; below these lateral spots and alternating 

 with them is a second series; these are mostly black, but often in- 

 close a little brown, and lie partly on the lower rows of scales and 

 partly on the ends of the ventrals; between these series of spots 

 or blotches is a ground color of grayish, minutely mottled with 

 black, the mottling appearing most strongly on the sides; the belly 

 is white (sometimes tinged with red), variegated with small quach-ate 

 blotches of black. Prominent on the posterior portion of the head 

 (fig. 54) is a Y-shaped mark of the ground color, edged with black, 

 and separated from the white of the neck by a brown band on each 

 side that joins the first dorsal blotch with the brown of the head. 

 The ground color of the side of the neck is carried forward above the 

 eye to meet a transverse band of the same color across the frontal 

 plate. This cross band is bounded in front by a brown bar, narrowly 

 edged with black, which crosses the posterior portions of the pre- 



