_concinnus_, the latter including the populations of the northwest
coast in Oregon, Washington and British Columbia.

Subsequent more detailed studies by later workers with more abundant
material led to the recognition of some subspecies that Ruthven
thought invalid and led to the resurrection of some names that he
had placed in synonomy. Van Denburgh and Slevin (1918:198) recognized
_infernalis_ as the subspecies occurring over most of California and
southern Oregon, differing from more northern populations in having
more numerous ventrals and caudals and a paler ground color. Fitch
(1941:575) revived the name _pickeringii_ for a melanistic population
of western Washington and southwestern British Columbia, restricting
the name _concinnus_ to a red-headed and melanistic population of
northwestern Oregon, and restricting the name _infernalis_ to a
pale-colored population in the coastal strip of California.

These changes left most of the populations formerly included in
_concinnus_ and _infernalis_ without a name, and Fitch (_op. cit._)
revived _Thamnophis sirtalis tetrataenia_ (Cope) to apply to
them. However, Fox (1951:257) demonstrated that the type of _T. s.
tetrataenia_ came from the San Francisco peninsula (rather than
from "Pit River, California" as erroneously stated in the original
description) and that the name was applicable to a localized
peninsular population rather than to the wide-ranging far western
subspecies, which he named _T. s. fitchi_. The range of _fitchi_
includes California west of the Colorado and Mohave deserts
(except for the narrow strip of coast occupied by _infernalis_ and
_tetrataenia_), Oregon except the northwestern part, Washington east
of the Cascade Range, most of British Columbia, extreme southeastern
Alaska (occurring farther north than any other terrestrial reptile of
North America) and parts of Idaho.

Neither Fox (1951) nor Fitch (1941) defined the eastern limits of
_fitchi_ or discussed its relationship to the subspecies _parietalis_.
Wright and Wright (1957:849) stated: "Fitch ... did not even mention
the big scrap basket form _parietalis_, from which he pulled _T. s.
fitchi_ (old _tetrataenia_). That comparison remains to be made, and
the east boundary of _fitchi_ and the west boundary of _parietalis_
are still nebulous." We have undertaken to define better than has been
done before the ranges of _parietalis_ and _fitchi_ and to list
the diagnostic characters separating t