Western Rattlesnake (Crotalus oreganus)

Created: February 25th, 2015 - 05:11 PM
Last Modified: February 26th, 2015 - 05:31 PM Entered by: Alan St. John
Record 216585

Country: United States		State: Oregon	County: Crook County	Time: 2010-07-21 21:00:00
Qty: 1	Age: Adult	Sex: --	Method: Road cruising	Habitat: sagebrush/juniper association in rocky canyon, near riparian zone
Body Temperature: -----		Air Temperature: 75.00F	Ground Temperature: -----	Humidity: -----
Sky Conditions: Clear		Moon Phase: -----	Elevation: 4000.00ft	Barometric Pressure: -----

Notes

On a warm summer evening at dusk, this specimen was found crossing a gravel road in the Bear Creek drainage, east of Bend. In this area of Oregon where the open sagebrush country of the Great Basin meets the forested Blue Mountains, all rattlesnakes have a blended mixture of oreganus and lutosus characteristics. The 50 to 75 mile wide zone of intergradation between the two subspecies runs eastward from the Bend area for about 300 miles to the Snake River near Baker City.

Vouchers

Comments

Posted by Alan St. John on Feb 26, 2015 at 03:57 PM

Thanks for the kind words. Yeah, for what it's worth, I wanted to clarify this because there have been proposals to elevate oreganus and lutosus as separate full species, based on mtDNA analysis. I think that would be bogus, considering the obvious evidence of a 300-mile-long intergrade zone in Oregon. They're both merely geographic subspecific variations of the same kind of rattlesnake. And actually, there's also evidence of a similar intergrade zone in central Idaho's Salmon River Canyon where the ranges of oreganus and viridis meet----which are of course currently considered different species after a reclassification several years ago.

Posted by Christopher Meachum on Feb 25, 2015 at 05:47 PM

Nicely done explanation!

Posted by Jeff Teel on Feb 25, 2015 at 05:47 PM

Very cool record. Sweet looking snake as well.