![]() ![]() At the northern end of the Sierra Madre Oriental, in the region between Saltillo and Monterrey, the ranges of L. mexicana to the south-where their ranges approach but apparently do not meet and there is no evidence of hybridization. There seems to be a clear distinction between this form and L. Relationships: Scientific understanding of this taxon remains elusive. Some snakes display patterns that are not quite leonis-phase and not quite milksnake/tricolor phase these “intermediate” morphs are much less often seen and can be exceptionally attractive. Variation among tricolor snakes includes number (and thus width) of the red-orange bands, the color of the light rings (white, gray, yellow, or orange), and head ornamentation. In some of the brown-tan (“buckskin”) forms, there is an orange suffusion that develops in the posterior part of the body and increases anteriorly, becoming more pronounced during the transition from hatchling to adult. In these, ground color can range from almost white, to gray, brown, orange, rose, tan, pale green, dark green, and shades in between. ![]() As a tour of our Gallery reveals, there is great variation within those two general pattern types, especially among leonis-morph animals. leonis are categorized as “leonis” morphs (characterized by relatively narrow red/orange bands with black borders) or tricolor morphs, commonly referred to as “milksnake” phase (looking, as the name suggests, like a tri-colored Lampropeltis triangulum). ![]()
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