I think when Rainer very briefly talked to Bechtel about this, Bechtel may have drastically over-simplified it for conversations sake to Rainer and actually meant that it can "sometimes" be used interchangeably, but only in certain cercumstances.

As we both know, Yellow doesn't mean red, and red doesn't mean yellow.....and never did...LOL!

The whole misconception lies with the xanthophores being responsible for producing both red and yellow pigments. And I have a feeling that id Bechtel did know the differences himself, he may have simply left out the part about axanthophores produce red and yellow pigments known as pteridines. And that they can vary in color from pure yellow to pure red, as well as any intermediate shades in between. Or that xanthophores that possess a predominantly red coloration are referred to as erythrophores.

I can almost guarantee Bechtel didn't get into any of this stuff real deep at all and probably wanted to just go about his business at the show when it was brought up briefly in front of the table at Daytona.

Like I said, if this is truly the case and the terms are interchangeable, then my very green/yellow Florida king is anerythristic AND axanthic even though she displayed ZERO red pigment, but plenty of yellow coloration..HAHAHA!!

In my opinion, only if a certain type of snake naturally displays BOTH reds and yellows (i.e. shades of orange too), and it is missing BOTH of these colorssuch as with what are known as anery and axanthic Florida kings, only then could you even consider using the terms interchangeably. This is what I think Bechtel may have meant. I think he just kept it extremely basic that day if he did know the difference.

I think the so-called "anery" floridana are nothing more than a slightly different strain of axanthism. Because if they were true anerythristics, the snakes would only naturally display browns and pure red, never any yellows.

Rainer walking up to Bechtel and hashing all of these intricacies out would be like me walking up to "Big Daddy" Don Garlits at a drag racing event, ask him a couple quick/brief questions, and go back home thinking I knew all there was to know about drag racing engines..LOL!



~Doug
-----
"a snake in the grass is a GOOD thing"

serpentinespecialties.webs.com


"some are just born to troll and roll"

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