#truly one of the taxonomical clades of all time

[mytardisisparked]

Do you ever just think about xenarthrans.

[dragimalsdaydreams]

so I’ve been wanting to write up my take on ‘werefolk’ for a while, but haven’t rly felt the inspiration to do so until recently when a certain someone got me into reading Teen Wolf fanfic even tho I don’t watch the show lmfa o

my biggest problems w/ most interpretations of werefolk are 1) that the human parts of these creatures must constantly ‘battle’ their ‘primal’ sides (fuck anthropocentricism honestly), and 2) there’s usually very weak explanation for how werefolk came to be in the first place.

my take on werefolk is that they’re actually fusions of two separate, individual beings, rather than a human with nonhuman “side-effects”

~Table of Contents~

Terms

Initial Fusion

Species Involved

Melding

Reproduction and Inheritance

Shifting

Consciousness

Random Facts

~Terms~

Fusion- when used as a noun, this refers to an organism composed of two separate beings. this is the term I will exclusively be using here, though there are plenty of other terms for Fusions. “Werefolk” (singular: “Were”) is the next most common term, though it is more dated (not necessarily derogatory, merely old). older Fusions are more likely to embrace “Werefolk” as a label, while younger Fusions usually only do so ironically or among elders. more specific “Were-” labels like “Werewolf”, “Weretiger”, etc. vary by community, and some will prefer the broader Werefolk/Fusion over specific labels, or vis-versa. it all depends on the culture and history surrounding that particular Fusion community, as well as individual preferences. “shape-shifter” is simply considered juvenile and not taken seriously by most Fusions.

Meld- the level of metaphysical fusion between the two beings contained within a Fusion, ranging from, “two completely individual beings,” to, “one fully meshed being”. despite popular assumption, this term is used to measure mental ‘meshing’ across generations, not within an individual Fusion’s lifetime. this will be explained in more detail in the ‘Melding’ section.

Partners vs. Phases- these terms refer to each ‘side’ of a Fusion’s being. either term could be more correct depending on the generation of Fusion and level of meld (again, this will be elaborated on in the ‘Melding’ section). preferred term varies by individual, though most Fusions are fine with either.

Shift/Flip/Switch- the action of changing from one partner/phase in a Fusion to another. all three terms are used interchangeably by most Fusions, but here I’ll primarily be using “shift”. “in-shift” will refer to the phase/partner who is currently in primary control of the Fusion, while “out-shift” will refer to the phase/partner who isn’t currently in primary control of the Fusion. 

~Initial fusion~

the act of fusion creates what are called ‘initial’ or ‘1st gen’ Fusions. their offspring may be numbered by generation afterwards, and are automatically born Fusions (thus, do not participate in the act of fusion to come into existence).

fusion is the closest possible bond on a physical and metaphysical level. few are ready to undertake this intensive process, but the reward—if performed properly—is euphoric for both parties involved.

trust and determination are absolute requirements for this process to work. if these aren’t present, the process will not initiate. similarly, consent from both sides is required, or the process will not initiate—a forced fusion is utterly impossible. essentially, fusion requires equal spiritual energy given by both partners, and if this isn’t the case, it simply can’t work.

Pre-fusion

the act of fusion is an incredibly intensive process that requires much mental/physical prepwork. if done carefully and correctly, fusion shouldn’t result in much lasting injury beyond the act besides some unavoidable mental/physical bruising.

on the mental front, those participating in a fusion must meditate and calm their minds several weeks before the act, working on syncing their minds and souls all the while. physically, each partner must bulk up on carbs, protein, and iron for several weeks. while proper fusion shouldn’t leave scars, the process itself involves a lot of tearing, blending, and resewing of flesh and bone. this, inevitably, requires a bit of extra energy and material to work with, as a lot of blood and tissue is naturally lost in the process.

because of all this prepwork, a magical medium (typically one specialized in healing) is highly recommended to help the process along, but not necessarily required. mediums are especially useful considering how long the fusion can last, and the excruciating physical and mental pain involved in the act. it’s really no surprise that unsupervised fusions tend to result in longer recovery periods and lasting scars, despite the determination and intentions of the partners involved.

Fusion

fusion is an exhausting, terrifying, gory process. nothing can prevent this—not love, not gentle easing, nor even the help of a medium. these things can soothe the process, but can’t eliminate the consequences.

physically, every cell is in overdrive—DNA is unpacking, migrating, and repacking at unimaginable rates, cells in one body are accommodating for the space taken by the cells of another, and tissues are unraveling into impossibly thin strands only to whip back into new positions. bones break, muscles shake, and nerves alight into a frenzy as they try to keep up with new orientations.

mentally, two consciousness are shattering-- some fragments collide and merge, while others shift and widen cracks to make room for other fragments. the process isn’t perfect—the ragged edges of emotions and memories cut and tear at one other as they vie for prominent positions in consciousness—but this heals with time.

if blood, gore, and excess emotional energy paint the location of a fusion, then the process was likely a success.

Post-fusion

much like the pre-fusion prep, post-fusion recovery involves a lot of aftercare in the form of eating, sleeping, and meditation. many mediums are happy to help in this process as well, though most Fusions prefer family or friends at this point.

recovery can last several weeks, or even months in some cases. during this recovery period, the Fusion must shift between each partner every few hours (or however long it takes them to shift), gradually increasing the time spent as each partner until they can comfortably and safely spend more than a day at a time as each partner (and the shift time has decreased to at least an hour).

after the recovery period, most Fusions should be able to comfortably spend at least a week or two at a time as each partner before shifting. the shift itself also shouldn’t take much more than 30-60 minutes, or require as much bulking-up beforehand. shifting still results in some blood loss and gore, but barely enough to leave a dent in an overall Fusion’s mass (though that doesn’t necessarily make the cleanup process any more pleasant..).

~Species Involved~

fusion typically works best between those with similar minds (everything from temperament, interpretation skills, senses, neurology, etc. are considered) and similar DNA. thus, fusion between individuals of the same species works best, then gets more difficult with each taxonomic step away from one another (by genus, then family, then order, etc). phyla seems to be the hard cut-off between potential Fusion species, though specific difficulties in fusion between taxonomic levels below that are uncertain, and may well vary between different taxonomic groups.

the relative sizes of the partners in question are also critical, as the mass taken up by one partner must be used to build the mass of the other. while it isn’t impossible for partners with size differences to fuse (since the process of fusion is largely driven by metaphysical/neurological/genetic factors), it can be a highly risky process. there does come a point where the size difference is just too much, and the partners may initially fuse, but will eventually perish due to the inconsistent mass distribution during the shifting process. however, the cut-off in relative size difference varies depending on the precautions the Fusion is willing to take to uphold the larger phase/partner (to be discussed further in the ‘Shifting’ section). more careful Fusions of this type will last longer than Fusions who are less willing to make accommodations and/or do not have proper access to accommodations.

despite all this, fusion within the same species is exceedingly rare because most individuals are content with platonic/romantic bonds, and the resulting Fusion of same species doesn’t necessarily make for a more powerful/skilled individual (since the skillsets of each partner are typically on the same relative level compared to distinct-species Fusions). distinct-species Fusions, on the other hand, usually blend diverse skillsets, and help bridge the gap that tends to leave non-fused bonds between different species lacking (we can never truly comprehend other species’ experiences, after all). this is usually appealing to those looking to fuse.

while human/nonhuman Fusions are the most popularized, there have been plenty of examples of Fusions between nonhuman species, such as crow/wolf Fusions. however, since there is much less public interest in Fusions of this sort, research into nonhuman Fusions is sadly lacking. nonhumans may very well fuse among themselves just as often as humans do with nonhumans, but we don’t currently know for sure.

there is much debate over when the ability to fuse developed in evolutionary history, and what resulting clades of animals are even capable of it. current research suggests that any organism with at least a nerve chord is physically/neurologically capable of fusion, but some level of sociality is required on the psychological/metaphysical level in order to occur. thus, fusion is common in social species (of which, many are mammalian and avian), and much less common as sociality decreases.

as a sidenote, Fusion classification is kind of a nightmare and a subject of hot debate among taxonomists. much like lichen, there’s no real systematic way to classify a Fusion unless you break them down to their component parts and individually classify those parts. but doing so ignores the complex intimacy of the parts in question, and the effects these parts have on one another on even an evolutionary level.

~Melding~

again, melding refers to the level of metaphysical fusion between the two consciousness’ contained within a Fusion. 1st gen Fusions will always be two individual beings, no matter the circumstances. this is simply the nature of initial fusion. despite what the phrase implies, there are still two consciousness’ living in one being, each with their own goals, memories, experiences, etc. yes, the individual minds mesh intimately, but they are still individuals. fully-melded Fusions, on the other hand, are one wholly-realized being. they are one consciousness, and merely have different phases of self and body. there will still be things that either phase can’t access because of distinctive neural networks (explained in more detail in the ‘Consciousness’ section), but each phase is relatively easy to access and shift to when needed.

thus we see the need for both “partners” and “phases” as terms here— “partners” typically refers to early-gens’ individual Fusion sides, while “phases” typically refers to later-gens’ melded Fusion sides.

depending on the species and souls involved in the initial fusion, the level of meld can vary. the rule of thumb is that the closer the original partners are in terms of neurological mapping and DNA, the more fully they will initially meld, and the more quickly generations after them will result in fully-melded Fusions. typically, it takes around 4-5 generations for the descendants of a 1st gen Fusion to eventually result in a seamless fusion of consciousness. though this varies widely—Fusions of the same species can take as little as 2 generations to fully meld, while Fusions whose partners belong to completely different taxonomic classes can take as many as 8 generations. thus, each successive generation after gen 1 gets more stable until a plateau of mental/physical stability and melding is reached.

though this is only a simplified description of melding, when in reality melding can vary quite a bit across family trees. the offspring of a 1st gen Fusion and a fully-melded Fusion can result in rather unpredictable melding-- the offspring may be a mid-meld just as easily as a nearly-full meld or barely-melded Fusion. there’s no real way to predict the level of offspring meld when the level of meld in the parents doesn’t quite match up. 

~Reproduction and Inheritance~

all cells in a Fusion always contain the DNA sets of both a Fusion’s phases, no matter the phase they currently hold. the in-shift DNA is simply active in the bodies’ cells, while the out-shift DNA is dormant—bundled up tight in the nucleolus until it’s reactivated for shifting. thus, the same goes for gametes, which always contain both DNA sets for a Fusion’s phases. the successful production of Fusion offspring depends entirely on the couple in question, and how their respective gametes react to one another.

Fusion x non-Fusion

Fusions can reproduce with non-Fusions of either species they are composed of, so long as they physically are that species during the act. the respective DNA for the matching species involved in the act will carry out meiosis naturally, creating a new being for that side of the resulting Fusion. the parent Fusion’s other set of DNA, however, will carry over to the offspring fully intact. since there is no matching set of DNA from the non-Fusion parent to perform meiosis with, this essentially results in a clone of those genes for that side of the offspring Fusion. as an example, if a human produces offspring with a human/wolf Fusion, only the human genetic material will undergo meiosis and result in a fresh new human ‘half’ for their offspring, while the wolf DNA attached to the Fusion parent will simply carry over fully intact.

if the non-Fusion parent carries the offspring in this pairing, they may run into difficulties during the process of pregnancy/incubation, particularly if there’s a decent size difference between the offspring’s phases, as the offspring will shift frequently during development. this could result in dangerous health issues for the carrying non-Fusion parent, and/or miscarriage if the size difference is too large.

matching Fusion x Fusion

in a pairing involving two Fusions whose species both match, the genetic material for both parents’ Fusion species will undergo meiosis and result in fresh new phases for the offspring.

disparate Fusion x Fusion

fusion can only stably handle two partners at a time; any Fusion of over two individuals is impossible. thus, the 3-way competing species genes in this pairing would automatically knock out the two species that don’t match. for example, a human/wolf Fusion paired with a human/cat Fusion would simply produce human offspring resulting from the shared human genes of their parents.

it’s MUCH more difficult to produce successful offspring from these pairings due to several factors. for one, the process of “knocking out” the non-matching parental genes is extremely difficult, considering how intimately these genes are fused in the parents. thus, successful fertilization is a rare feat. then there’s the process of pregnancy/incubation, which can pose a special set of problems for Fusions with a decent size difference between phases (since the developing offspring obviously won’t be shifting to a phase they don’t have in the first place). this, then, can result in miscarriage if the size difference of the carrying Fusion’s phases is too large. 

even if the development/birth is a success, these offspring have to deal with a special set of social issues compared to their Fusion comrades, as they aren’t actually a Fusion, but they are related to and often intimately entrenched in Fusion culture/issues. plus, they can’t connect to their parents’ other Fusion species on as intimate a level as they would if they could also shift to the same species.

Fusion offspring will shift phases during development, and both phases will develop at the same relative rate (which changes between phases). this holds true for Fusions developing in eggs as well. the parent Fusions (particularly the carrying Fusion) will feel compelled to shift with their offspring throughout the process.

if the carrying Fusion has a womb in their conceiving phase, but not in their other phase, the womb will still carry over to their other phase, but will simply have no physical opening connected to the outside world. any physiological ‘plans’ for birth will be halted temporarily as well, if the carrying Fusion is near their delivery date. some of these Fusions near their delivery date are shocked to find that they immediately fall into contractions after they shift back to their carrying phase. these wombs are still connected to the carrying Fusion’s physiological state, though, and still receive nutrients and hormones from the parent’s body. 

Fusions of live-birth x egg-laying species work similarly, if one phase does not have a uterus. however, even if the offspring was conceived during the egg-laying phase, the live-birth phase will override this reproductive setup, and the offspring will fully develop in the womb of the carrying Fusion. if both phases are egg-laying, the carrying Fusion will lay an egg, but it will always be the larger egg of the two species contained in the Fusion. this “overriding” function of development allows the developing offspring plenty of room for both their phases to develop, no matter the potential size differences between phases.

Fusions are always born as the species their carrying parent was at the time of birth, and tend to follow a quick day-by-day shifting schedule for a few weeks afterwards. any nearby Fusions (particularly the parents of the offspring) will feel psychologically compelled to shift phases in tandem with the offspring; it’s theorized that this is a subconscious measure to allow each phase of the offspring to properly socially/psychologically develop with others of the same species. after that, as the offspring’s body adjusts to the outside world, their shifting schedules slow down to once a week. they can’t spend more than a week in either phase until they pass adolescence. 

since young Fusions must allow the neurological networks of both their phases to learn and develop individually, it typically takes born Fusions twice as long to neurologically develop compared to non-Fusions. this, unfortunately, results in stigmatization in certain human societies, especially within educational settings that expect faster results.

~Shifting~

most Fusions spend about an equal amount of time in both phases, as this is most healthy and fulfilling for both sides. this can be accomplished on any variety of schedules, from daily to weekly shifts. schedules also depend heavily on respective waking/sleeping cycles. for example, nocturnal/diurnal Fusions may compromise by sleeping for a few hours between each sunrise and sunset, then shifting to either phase for nighttime/daytime hours.

though it’s possible, it’s not recommended that Fusions remain in one phase for more than two weeks, as this can cause serious mental/physical health issues. more than three weeks, however, absolutely pushes the limit of healthy standards, and should be avoided at all costs. 

sadly, half-human Fusions are often put under societal pressure to spend most of their time as humans. Fusions pressured too heavily into this have even tried to keep from shifting for up to a month at a time—and worse yet, have only allowed themselves to remain nonhuman for a day or so. this treatment leaves their nonhuman phase agitated, damaged, and full of repressed energy, which can result in dangerous consequences for the Fusion and anyone nearby when they finally allow themselves to shift. such forced behavior typically results in a permanently damaged body and psyche, with Fusions unable to control their emotions and senses in either phase. this only further stigmatizes Fusions, causing more Fusions to repress themselves and break their minds and bodies. movements to change this perception of Fusions have gained traction in recent years, which have thankfully decreased the level of phase repression, but there is a long way to go before all stigmatization is gone.

pausing in a mid-shift form is also highly dangerous to a Fusion’s mental and physical health. if stopped mid-shift, the brain and body don’t know what to do and how exactly to orient themselves, causing disorientation and—at worst—a damaged psyche. for merely one example of any number of problems with mid-shifts, the throat of a human/wolf Fusion might be able to speak human language, but the brain might only be able to interpret wolf vocalizations, leaving the Fusion speaking gibberish as an attempt at communication. then there’s also the fact that shifting naturally involves the tearing of flesh, so pausing mid-shift can leave a Fusion’s body vulnerable to infection, or may leave vital internal organs ruptured. of course, most Fusions don’t purposefully pause mid-shift, but it is a common consequence of phase repression. some Fusions have been recorded stuck in mid-shift for days at a time after repressing their shifts, which in itself results in horrific, long-term mental/physical health effects.

Fusions with a large size difference between phases must take special shifting precautions compared to Fusions whose phases are similarly-sized. as mentioned in the ‘Species Involved’ section, there is a certain point where the size difference is too great to support a Fusion beyond the initial fusion, but it is certainly not impossible for size differences to exist. these Fusions can’t just bulk up on food when shifting from the smaller to the larger phase, since the smaller phase can’t realistically take in the amount of mass needed to uphold the larger phase. instead, these Fusions must lay near raw materials (proteins, irons, salts, and other important aspects of living organisms) during the shifting process, and the Fusion’s shifting body will automatically pick up and process any nearby materials from the environment to make up for the lack of mass immediately available within the body. the easiest source of raw materials is another body, which works out great for carnivores who want to use the rest of a recent kill for their shift. this is not a palatable solution for every Fusion, however, so other Fusions with a great size difference may instead save the excess flesh dropped when shifting from the larger to the smaller phase and use it for mass-buildup during the shift from small-to-large later on. these Fusions must also be wary of any potential passerby, because the process of shifting leaves the Fusion largely unconscious. thus they can’t control what their shifting body may pick up for use towards their shifting mass. unlucky passerby in these instances may lose a limb or two by accident...

~Consciousness~

due to the nature of neurological mapping and the intimate interplay between the body and mind, it’s IMPOSSIBLE for both phases of a Fusion to be fully conscious at the same time. in 1st gen Fusions this is much more distinct, as the partner whose physical body is currently in-shift is the one primarily “steering” the body, while the other partner is more-or-less a vague passenger, observing as much as they can comprehend through the neural map of a body that they weren’t born into. 

at the same time, no phase/partner’s consciousness can EVER be FULLY “locked out” when their partner is in-shift, though they can have highly varied levels/types of awareness. some Fusions’ phases will be barely conscious when out-shift, while others’ phases will still be highly conscious and exert much influence when out-shift. 

these varying levels of consciousness can manifest in different ways depending on the Fusion’s overall meld and neurological congruency. for example, early-gen Fusions whose out-partners are highly-conscious tend to experience more mental dissonance than fully-melded Fusions whose out-phases are similarly highly conscious. early-gen Fusions have to reconcile the opinions/goals of two individuals during every decision, which isn’t always easy, no matter how much the partners may care for or respect one another. fully-melded Fusions, on the other hand, typically experience their out-phases as subconscious drivers of certain actions and decisions rather than unique consciousness’, even if their out-phases are highly-conscious

there are also things that simply can’t fully carry over from one phase to the other. while the phases do mesh more soundly in later-gen Fusions, the distinct neural maps of different bodies still cause unavoidable schisms between phases. for example, the wolf phase of a human/wolf Fusion will keep some knowledge of human language from their human phase, but much will still be lost to the distinct neural map of the wolf brain, and they won’t be able to interpret human language in the same way or to the same degree as they will in their human phase.

this schism is even apparent in memory recall, in what many call “shift fog”. basically, certain memories of events during one phase are temporarily lost when a Fusion shifts to their other phase because the neural networks of one brain simply can’t comprehend what was experienced by the other brain. for example, humans can see more colors than wolves can, so these extra colors seen in the human phase of a Fusion can’t pass over in memory to their wolf phase because these colors are literally incomprehensible to the wolf phase. thus, human memories involving these colors are much more fragmented in the wolf phase compared to memories that feature much less of these colors. these memories are not lost forever, and will return in full once the Fusion shifts back to their human phase.

~Random Facts~

Fusion lifespans tend to range midway between the lifespans each species they consist of. human/wolf fusions, for example, tend to live up to around 40-45 years since wolf lifespans range from 6-8 years, and human lifespans range from 70-80 years. this can vary depending on the amount of time a Fusion spends in either form; a human/wolf Fusion who spends more time as a human will have a longer lifespan than a Fusion of the same kind who spends more time as a wolf. both phases age at the same rate, which changes with the phase in-shift. thus, a human/wolf Fusion who is a teen in their human phase will also be a teen in their wolf phase, despite how the difference in timespan needed to reach the “teen years” of each respective species.

gender expression among Fusions is just as diverse as that of any non-fused creature—if not more so. the majority of Fusions tend to identify midway between the genders of their phases. if both phases are girls, then the Fusion overall is typically a girl, but if the genders of each phase differ, then the most common genders seen are either agender or genderfluid (with gender switching between phases). while these are the most commonly seen approaches to gender, they hardly encompass the true depth and diversity of Fusion gender expression. there are Fusions who, for example, may be genderfluid in one phase, but very much male in their other phase. this isn’t even to mention the genders that arise from Fusions who are partially comprised of a species that has no concept of gender whatsoever.

names can be complicated for Fusions, especially 1st gen and young Fusions. early-gen Fusions tend to prefer two different names for each of their partners, while later-gen Fusions are happy with one name for their whole self. sometimes this even changes across a Fusion’s lifespan.

[phostracks]

Nerodia fasciata fasciata, the Southern banded watersnake Grand Bay Wildlife Management Area in Lowndes county, Georgia; 05 April 2012

Forgive me; this post is long. I’m working this stuff out through the act of writing…

So far, on our still-young phosTracks photoblog, we’ve seen a handful of Florida banded watersnakes, Nerodia fasciata pictiventris. This post presents the South Georgia representative of the species, the Southern banded watersnake, Nerodia fasciata fasciata. That being said, the snake you see here probably isn’t a Southern banded watersnake. Also, yes it is. And why so? Because it probably isn’t. Confused yet? Welcome to my world.

I find myself quite skeptical of most subspecies designations. In many cases, such subspecies divisions were originally driven by archaic observations based on phenotypic, observable characteristics such as colors, size, weight, and so on. In a sense, this potentially disregards simple regional variations seen from population to population — or, actually, it makes too much of them. Is such regional variation enough to warrant an actual phylogenetic division within a species? Well, maybe. Or maybe not. And what is a “sub”species anyway?

Linnaean Classification of dogs, from cnx.org.

As DNA sampling and phylogenetic analysis continues to advance, we live in an era where taxonomic classification as we know it is undergoing a significant evolution of its own. I do indeed believe that the Linnaean world I grew up in, the one where we learned Kingdom-Phylum-Class-Order-Family-Genus-Species, is on its way out. Dating back to the 1750s, Linnaeus founded our modernistic notion of binomial nomenclature and the taxonomic schema I was taught when I was a kid. It was nifty. Everything fit into nice little boxes (as seen in the educational image to the right). As time progressed, however, we started adding strata to the system to accommodate increasingly-perceived complexities in the real world of organic life and evolutionary diversity. We started creating suborders, infraclasses, suprafamilies, and so on. It turned out the world was far more complicated than the Linnaean system was originally designed for.

Picture this: Imagine you’re put in charge of building a writing center for new, local college from the ground-up. You don’t really know how many students you’ll ultimately serve, and you certainly don’t know what kinds of assignments they’ll ultimately need help with. Looking around, you think you have a pretty good idea of what to expect, so you build your writing center as best you can. Once the doors open and students start coming in, however, you soon discover there are far more students than you anticipated, and these students have a wide-ranging orders of concern. Some need help with commas, other with organization. Some have difficulty navigating digital technologies, others have no sense of audience. Further, you realize that different courses and disciplines have radically different types of assignments, and different teachers have radically different measures of assessments, goals, and outcomes. In short, you realize that the writing center you built is not optimally designed to deal with all of these issues as they exist in the actual, real, and fluid world. So, you have a choice: Do you add on to the already-flawed writing center infrastructure? Or do you build a new system to better accommodate your students and their ever-changing needs?

That’s sort of the dilemma with Linnaean taxonomy. For decades, we’ve been adding on to that flawed, closed system, keeping those little boxes in place. There is, however, a move to create a more-fluid, more-open system of cladistics — one that focuses on taxa as clades, subsections of taxa not necessarily bound to the pre-existing strata-titles of the Kingdom-Phylum-Class-Order-Family-Genus-Species box system. Life is, after all, rather complicated and ever-changing, and complicated systems rarely function with easily-divisible binaries. Cladistics recognizes that everything is still happening. In a way, Linnaean classification is based on categorizing things into their little boxes, whereas cladistics is about better understanding evolutionary relationships and the movement of species through evolutionary history. In Linnnaean taxonomy, to think that a static system will serve radically different taxa —such as the insects and the mammals— equally is, come to think of it, absurd. It’s like having two shoeboxes and then trying to jam radically different balls equally into each box. A tennis ball is not a golf ball.  Anyhow, it is along these lines, the lines of the judicially nice and tidy boxes of Linnaean taxonomy, that my faith in subspecies designations begins to fall apart.

Cladogram of dogs from FractalFoundation.org.

Though it does sometimes occur, rarely are there natural borders that actually divide one subspecies from another (like, say, a massive river or a mountain range). Instead, you often end up with broad zones of intergradation — areas where two subspecies overlap and breed with one another. This is assuming that subspecies designations are valid divisions in the first place. Thinking about these “zones of intergradation” helps us keep and maintain our binary thinking with the subspecies: This is the Florida subspecies, and that is the Southern subspecies; it just so happens that sometimes they cross over. Sometimes they’re both.

But what if we just disregard that “subspecies” division altogether? What if we recognize that the phenotypic nature of species can range and “drift” not just in time but also in space? What if it’s not a matter of black and white, this vs. that? What if it’s all just shades of gray. This is why I’m attracted to cladistics/cladograms (seen in the insert to the right); it affords more value in the flowing of evolution history and diversity not just between species, but also within species, and it does so without trying to add labelled boxes onto the other labelled boxes. With cladograms, it’s easier to think of variation within species without feeling obligated to box and divide one subspecies from another.

So, that brings us to the banded watersnake we see here…

Nerodia fasciata is the recognized genus and species for the banded watersnake. In North America, we have three currently-recognized subspecies, two of which are in Florida and/or Georgia: The Florida banded watersnake, Nerodia fasciata pictiventris, and the Southern banded watersnake, Nerodia fasciata fasciata. In peninsular Florida, the default is always N. f. pictiventris. In central Georgia, the default is always N. f. fasciata. But what about the border in between? What about the broad zone of intergradation in far north Florida and extreme south Georgia? Truly, the “line” between the two species is somewhat a myth when you step into that fluid zone of intergradation.

In their book, North American watersnakes: A natural history (2003), J. Whitfield Gibbons and Michael E. Dorcas describe in great detail the natural histories of each of North America’s watersnake species. Regarding the two banded watersnake subspecies at stake in this post, Gibbons and Dorcas draw from a 1938 article by William Clay and summarize the differences as follows:

“Nerodia f. fasciata have dark ventral markings that are square, and they usually have more than 128 ventral scales. in contrast, N. f. pictiventris have ‘elongate dark areas near the anterior margins of the ventrals’ and fewer than 128 ventral scales’ (Clay 1938b). Both of these subspecies vary extensively in color pattern, having red, brown, or black crossbones dorsally on a lighter-colored yellowish, gray, or reddish background. Large individuals of either subspecies may become melanistic, obscuring the banding pattern, which may be obscure even in some smaller individuals.”

Elsewhere, in the Amphibians and reptiles of Georgia (2008), Camp, Gibbons, and Elliot write, “Of the three known subspecies, only the southern banded watersnake (N. f. fasciata) is found throughout most of the species’ Georgia range. The Florida banded watersanke (N. f. pictiventris) may occur in extreme southeastern Georgia.” This is further supported in Snakes of the southeast (2005), also by Gibbons and Dorcas, in which the authors show the only overlap of N. f. pictiventris into Georgia to be the tiniest tip of its southeastern and coastal edges.

The snake featured on this post was photographed at Grand Bay Wildlife Management Area in Lowndes county, Georgia, just northeast of Valdosta and perhaps two dozen miles from the Florida-Georgia border (well away from the coast). Judging by the range maps and distribution comments provided in Amphibians and reptiles of Georgia and Snakes of the southeast, this should be Nerodia fasciata fasciata, the Southern banded watersnake. Color pattern differentiation is essentially worthless in my experience because both subspecies are so heavily variable, so I decided to count the ventral scales on the snake. According to the Clay system (noted above), if the sum total of ventral scales is under 128, it should be the Florida banded watersnake. If it’s over 128, it should be the Southern banded watersnake. And what was the final count for the snake featured here? The snake that, according to the range maps, should be the Southern banded watersnake? The final count was 126 — two clicks into the Florida banded watersnake range. Ah, shit.

Which was it? Southern banded watersnake? Florida banded watersnake? Clearly this was an intergrade of the two, as were all the other banded watersnakes I photographed and worked with during my two years in southern Georgia. I repeated my ventral count a number of times with different individuals and came up with varying numbers between 126 and 130, both within the Florida and Southern subspecies ventral-count ranges.

 So, yeah, the whole subspecies thing is a bit of a mess. So many of these subspecies divisions are based on fairly insignificant and erratic morphological differences between populations over space, but who’s to say that these physical differences necessitate such phylogenetic differentiation? After all, the Florida banded watersnakes of South Florida will likely continue to adapt differently than the Florida banded watersnakes of South Florida — as human development increases and as new, non-native species continue to arrive. In speciation and diversity, evolution never really shuts down. Adaptation doesn’t call it a day. A “species” as we know it today is simply another transitional form in the fluid flow of time and evolution. Perhaps general “subspecies” nomenclature can be helpful in that it helps us understand the general regionality of what we’re talking about, but I prefer to not think of it as black vs. white when it comes to subspecies. As far as I can tell, the differences between the Florida and the Southern banded watersnakes are negligible at best, and with such a broad zone of intergradation, we really are dealign with fifty-thousand shades of gray.

The act of writing this post has forced me to reconsider how I’m tagging and linking species on phosTracks. I’ve been using traditional and contemporary subspecies trinomials in both the posts and in the main species index on the right column of the main page. I’ll continue using subspecies trinomials within blog posts because that’s how so many of us are wired to think about these organisms, but I’m going to stick to the binomial (genus+species) model in the big species list on the right. For example, instead of having two entries in the big list, one for the Florida banded watersnake and one for the Southern banded watersnake, I’ll just have one single link for all Banded watersnake subspecies. That sounds like a decent compromise with myself. Heh.

phosTracks will be back in a few days. I want to retro-fix some metadata on the site in response to this post and then take a little bit of a breather!

Sources:

Gibbons, J. W., & Dorcas, M. E. (2004). North American watersnakes: A natural history. Norman: UP Oklahoma.

Jensen, J. B., Camp, C. D, Gibbons, W., & Elliot, M. J. (2008). Amphibians and reptiles of Georgia. Athens: UP Georgia.

Gibbons, W., & Dorcas, M. (2005). Snakes of the southeast. Athens: UP Georgia.

The Southern Banded Watersnake (Nerodia fasciata fasciata), 05 April 2012 Nerodia fasciata fasciata, the Southern banded watersnake Grand Bay Wildlife Management Area in Lowndes county, …