>>Stripe and motley are different genes, though they are allelic to one another.



Actually, there are the same gene (same locus). They are different alleles. Just like like you have a gene for hair color, but you can have brown alleles or blond alleles. You just have THREE alleles for this gene: (1)stripe, (2) motley, and (3) normal.



>>If you breed a homozygous stripe to another homozygous stripe, you cannot get anything other than homozygous striped offspring...no motlies are possible.



Correct - completely....unless a striped motley is MISIDENTIFIED as a striped. This happens MUCH more than I like to think about. I believe this is why there is so much confusion.



>>What happens is that there are so-called striped/motlies (which may, or may not actually carry the striped gene, by the way) which look remarkably similar to homozygous stripes to many keepers.



Bingo. That's what I was re-enforcing above. Just count me as a "me, too" on all of this data.



Motleys and "striped motleys" can BOTH be heterozygous for stripe (but neither HAVE to be). If one of those motleys het for stripe are bred to a snake that is striped or ALSO het for striped, you should get motleys AND stripeds. Simple, eh?



KJ
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KJUN Snakehaven

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