For what it is worth, the phenotype is the only real indication that we have when we describe diamond, integrade or coastal. The whole east coast of NSW is obviously home to carpet python that are or seem genetically the same, but the colour and pattern changes as you go from sth to nth or nth to sth.
Only by getting out there and personally sighting wild pythons are you able to get an idea of what is what. And I believe, that the catchers and relocators (who see hundreds) have a much better idea again, then your weekend herper, because of the volume of snakes that they actually see.
I reckon the confusion with the labels of these pythons is due to firstly, not fully understanding the word integrade, and secondly that with so much written word on the net on this subject, newbies tend to over think the subject and make it much, much more complicated then it really is.
Think of it like the colours of a rainbow, where as you go up or down through the spectrum, you observe that the edges of the colours blend, but when you stand back and look at it, red is completely different to violet.
The photos Blue has put up show a semi striped python and a spotted python. The pattern is different but the colours would be the same, yellow on black. The further north you go, you would expect to find more of the striping, or joining of rosettes and less of the spotting, and the colour changing to show animals with browns and greys, finally resulting in the pattern that we recognise as coastal.
It is interesting though that where colonies of python are isolated, then there will be a more similar pattern and colour throughout that region, and if it isn't yet, then it is on the way to becoming.
In all the years of relocating snakes here on the central coast in the Gosford shire, I have never seen a partly striped or half striped animal like the one that is in the photo above, though I have caught and relocated many, that people here would without hesitation, call intergrade because of the rosettes that join. Gosford isn't in intergrade zone so these are diamonds.
Also Ron in an earlier post you said something about Gosford black and whites.
M.s.spilota here in Gosford are not black and white, they are black and yellow.
Like the rainbow analogy, the whites occur further south. So... basically the white goes from white to yellow to brown as you go north, and the pattern makes changes along the way as well. Before we started keeping pythons, wild type would have been true to form in each area, now around heavily populated zones (like Gosford etc) wild type is slowly being influenced by the number of escapee pythons on the loose. Not so much in the country areas though.
)... don't have to worry about gear changes on the 1300S Mike - it has an awesome "quickshift" - a no clutch upshift so just a tiny flick of the toe and you're in the next gear (the spark is momentarily retarded to allow for a smooth change, so the power roll-on is stepless. 0-100 in 2.7 sec. You can use the clutch at lower speeds but the roll-on of power when I get onto the highway from my local road is just awesome... Yes, I've never worked out the change in sentiment between girlfriends & wives lol!
