# What Carpet Python is this?



## Laikin (Jul 2, 2020)

Can anyone tell me what python this is? i live near Coffs Harbour, NSW


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## Herpetology (Jul 2, 2020)

Diamond python

Possibly (most likely) a Intergrade by the pattern


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## Laikin (Jul 2, 2020)

Ya, i thought it looked like a diamond, though it kind of looks like a Diamond cross Jungle


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## nick_75 (Jul 2, 2020)

Diamond/Coastal Carpet intergrade.


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## GBWhite (Jul 2, 2020)

I live in Bellingen (near Coffs Harbour). No intergrades around here (in fact the whole intergrade theory is well and truly open for debate). It's 100% what's referred to as a Coastal Carpet Python _(Morelia mcdowelli)_ but realistically a member of the _Morelia spilota_ complex.


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## Rob (Jul 2, 2020)

Yeah classic Coffs Coastal, the same type as my first snake 30+ years ago. Back then these things were in abundance amongst the banana plantations.


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## GBWhite (Jul 2, 2020)

Rob said:


> Yeah classic Coffs Coastal, the same type as my first snake 30+ years ago. Back then these things were in abundance amongst the banana plantations.
> 
> 
> View attachment 329459



Hi Rob ,

Mate they are still abundant right through this area. There are still remnants of banana plantations throughout the district and they are still a favourite haunt for Carpets. There was even an occasion many, many years ago when I was a young teenager and with some friends and we were herping in a banana plantation up behind the Big Banana. I got up in the roof an old run down house and ended up dragging out half a dozen various sized Carpetss from the roof trusses, then got out of the roof and found another couple in some bunches of bananas that were leaning up against the veranda of the house. As that was happening one of my friends decided to lift a corrugated iron water tank that was lying directly on the ground to see what was underneath and, to all our surprise, revealed the skeletal remains of a lady. Now that's another very long story but, in short, what happened was that a South Australian Truck Driver was eventually arrested and found guilty of her murder. 

I get an average of around a dozen or so Carpets visit my place from spring right through to autumn annually and consistently get FB notifications for them showing up at peoples places from Nambucca Heads to Woolgoolga. They even show up at peoples places during winter, only last week I had a neighbour about 60 metres down the road find one curled up in the rafters of her veranda and contacted me to ask if I thought it would be ok.

You know I find it funny how they refer to these M. mcdowelli as Coastal Carpets because you find ones identical to the ones around here right through the New England Tablelands and as far west as Moree and Narrabri, up through to Goondiwindi and on the western side of the Great Divide right up through Qld.

Over the years I've literally caught hundreds (probably closer to a couple of thousand) of the Morelia spilota group. Not just around here but all over the place from Eden on the NSW Sth Coast to Katherine NT and lots of places in between. And as far as intergrades go well...if that's the case with "Coastals/Diamonds" then out around Collarenebri, Brewarrina, North Star and Goodiwindi I have found individual specimens that share colours and patterns consistent with both "Coastals" and "Murray Darlings". Up through the tablelands and coastal Qld I've come across many individual Carpets that display colours and patterns consistent with both "Coastals" and "Jungles" and others that don't fit either. So why aren't all these also referred to as intergrades? Apart from Cogger mentioning it in his books, I don't know where the term originated but it will take a hell of a lot to convince me that from the Vic border to the NT they aren't just all phenotypes of the same species.

That's my little rave for the day...hahaha.

Cheers.


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## Sdaji (Jul 2, 2020)

GBWhite said:


> Hi Rob ,
> 
> Mate they are still abundant right through this area. There are still remnants of banana plantations throughout the district and they are still a favourite haunt for Carpets. There was even an occasion many, many years ago when I was a young teenager and with some friends and we were herping in a banana plantation up behind the Big Banana. I got up in the roof an old run down house and ended up dragging out half a dozen various sized Carpetss from the roof trusses, then got out of the roof and found another couple in some bunches of bananas that were leaning up against the veranda of the house. As that was happening one of my friends decided to lift a corrugated iron water tank that was lying directly on the ground to see what was underneath and, to all our surprise, revealed the skeletal remains of a lady. Now that's another very long story but, in short, what happened was that a South Australian Truck Driver was eventually arrested and found guilty of her murder.
> 
> ...



Interesting story about the Coffs Harbour Carpets. I've seen Carpets north and south of there and driven through Coffs many times but haven't seen any there (probably because I've only driven through and never tried to look for herps in the immediate area). Do you get much variation around there? Maybe I should take a look around some time.

As for 'intergrades', I agree that it's a silly term. We talk about 'Vic' Carpets and 'Brisbane' Carpets and 'Darwin' Carpets etc, but as is obvious to anyone who has herped widely in Australia, Carpets exist in a continuous spectrum rather than having a big chunk of each subspecies which are all consistent through their entire range with just a bit of an 'intergrade zone' where they meet. It's strange that such a silly way of thinking about the situation has become the norm. A Brisbane Carpet is as much an intergrade between a Coffs Harbour Carpet and Prosperpine Carpet as a Coffs Harbour Carpet is an intergrade between a Sydney and a Brisbane Carpet, and so on. We do have some genuine boundaries, like the Great Dividing Range which does a fair job of separating M.s.mcdowelli from M.s.metcalfei (occasionally some hybrids do occur of course). The term 'intergrade' became common and popular about 15 years ago when people found it as a 'nice' or 'acceptable' (even if inaccurate) way to describe captive hybrids. The so-called intergrades between Diamonds and Brisbanes, such as in Coffs, are intergrades rather than hybrids, but no more so than Sydney Carpets, Brisbane Carpets, Darwin Carpets, etc, are also intergrades. Crossing a Brisbane Carpet with a Sydney doesn't produce an intergrade, it produces a hybrid (an intersubspecific hybrid, which is not the same thing as an intergrade), although of course most people don't understand these terms and will argue.


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## WizardFromAus- (Jul 4, 2020)

GBWhite said:


> Hi Rob ,
> 
> Mate they are still abundant right through this area. There are still remnants of banana plantations throughout the district and they are still a favourite haunt for Carpets. There was even an occasion many, many years ago when I was a young teenager and with some friends and we were herping in a banana plantation up behind the Big Banana. I got up in the roof an old run down house and ended up dragging out half a dozen various sized Carpetss from the roof trusses, then got out of the roof and found another couple in some bunches of bananas that were leaning up against the veranda of the house. As that was happening one of my friends decided to lift a corrugated iron water tank that was lying directly on the ground to see what was underneath and, to all our surprise, revealed the skeletal remains of a lady. Now that's another very long story but, in short, what happened was that a South Australian Truck Driver was eventually arrested and found guilty of her murder.
> 
> ...


Skeletal remains of a lady ? Thats pretty full on mate, very interested in that story, did you guys find out who the lady was? 

Never mind read the rest lol still crazy story

Sent from my SM-A520F using Tapatalk


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