Intergrading things on purpose has ALWAYS been something I try to avoid at all costs. I also like to keep things exactly to the subspecific level. However, when something like the Black rat and Texas rat are involved, there is ALWAYS a chance that either/or genetic lineage is involved to at least SOME degree. They are just too closely related, and depending on who breeds what to what, and where an animal is actually caught, it can be impossible to discern.



They "key-out" meristic-wise(scalation, etc..) identical to each other, and many of either one?, depending where they are actually from can really be considered a clinal variant of sorts as well. So the bottom line here would be in my opinion, to just go ahead and breed them if you want. It's sort of like the "Honduran" milk thing.......they are what they are, and this cannot be reversed. Just try to do the best you can with keeping things as "pure" as you can, that's really all anyone can do here in this situation.



Some folks try to do there darndest to combine all sorts of weird genetics in their snake projects just because they CAN, but I have always thought this is not the right path for a large number of reasons.



Same exact thing can be said for leucistic rats, there is no doubt that many(probably not all) in the hobby have lindheimeri/obsoletus genetics involved also, it's just the way certain things are.





good luck with things!





~Doug
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"Better to be silent and thought a fool, than to open mouth and remove any doubt!"

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