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The number of American snakes whose morph lines originate in european countries seems kind of weird to me. This is in no way related to anyone in-particular. In fact my hypo everglades rat snakes started in a foreign country.

It is more that it is intriguing to me how many morphs come from overseas. I was told that the hypo/albino bairds rats started overseas as well as the hondurans and the hypo everglades. Any others?? Why do you guys think that is??

Later Jason

I noticed that the Jaguar Carpet Pythons another import throws some snakes that look like diamond crosses. My hunch is that some of these morphs are (created) by hybridizing and how would we know? Inbreeding is the second variable since they have limited access to some of these snakes from the U.S. Think about this if you sell a hybrid localy as pure and are found out you are out of business but send it overseas and you remain ananomous for the most part still not good business but who knows. Their limited gene pool is the most likely culprit though lining up recessive genes by forced in-breeding caused by lack of new blood.
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"Life without risk is to merely exist."

Well I am not saying that hybrids are what we are seeing and I am not saying they are not hybrids. A new look to the hypo honduran just popped up and they remind me of pueblans. Not saying they are but they do remind me.

I do know of some guys who sell wholesale who also hybridize. I also think that most of the US native snake that end up in Europe get there through wholesalers. So it may be a unknowing breeder that gets a albino this or a hypo that. It can also be attributed to less info or knowledge of what US snakes are what. The obsoleta are now what, 15-20 different subs to the US community but a gray rat and a black rat might be one snake to a guy in Italy.

I am not holding back on a trump card of info here or anything. I am just curious what you guys think. Yes the fact Dusty said his albino below is from a european line got me thinking but, I am in no way talking about that animal or that line. I actually think with the sub-ocs you have a good chance of knowing if they are pure or not by the scalation. Our other rats or the CA milks are another story.

Later Jason

The internet has made the world a much smaller place. I think the reality is a mixture of both. Let’s face it greed and money are the single largest motivator for most people. If they can plug an albino gene from a morph into an Indigo or some other already expensive snake someone will. Another thing to consider is with the technology we have now a days the ability is there. There are breeders that have been using artificial insemination for many years now. The process was explained to me and it is so simple it is silly. I even question some of the so called (NEW SPECIES) who knows. There may be some geneticist that has figured out how to splice some weird genes into the snakes egg how do we know that all of these ball python morphs aren’t the by product of some scientist splicing genes overseas? I could ramble on like some paranoid lunatic but let’s face it they have already made pigs that can glow in the dark we are only naive to think someone is not capitalizing on the naivety of the masses.
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"Life without risk is to merely exist."

They made glow in the dark pigs? That is kind of cool in a mad scientist kind of way. Got a link?
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0.1 Snow Corn "Hope"
1.0 Ball Python "Wilson" (Castaway)
1. Orange Albino Black Ratsnake "Chunk" (Goonies)
.1 Orange Albino Black Ratsnake "Peaches"
0.0.1 Mexican Black Kingsnake "Onyx"

Yes they have been splicing jellyfish genes into pigs and chickens (eggs) there are now genetic glow in the dark pigs, chickens and other stuff. I will see if I can get you the link. These animals can reproduce and make more glowing offspring!!!
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"Life without risk is to merely exist."

copy and paste this into your browser.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/4605202.stm
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"Life without risk is to merely exist."

http://aolsearch.aol.com/aol/redir?src=websearch&requestId=c44f4ecb080fb253&clickedItemRank=4&userQuery=Glow in the dark chicken&clickedItemURN=http://times.hankooki.com/lpage/tech/200502/kt2005020616161112350.htm&title=The Korea Times : South Korean Scientists Produce 2nd-Generation ...

Paste that into your browser!
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"Life without risk is to merely exist."

http://www.ekac.org/petplace.html
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"Life without risk is to merely exist."

Not quite what I was thinking. The money isn't there for this yet. The cost is way to high to research the info needed to do this... for a different colored snake.

I was thinking of something more along the lines of some hybrids some luck and some people who are not as familiar with the snake as the US market.

Gene splicing and mad scientist are a little to far off my map right now.

Later Jason

The most recent discovery was these adult all yellow chondros. What color do they start out as? (YELLOW) what causes a normal chondro to change from yellow to green? Hormones. Can hormones be blacked or regulated? I think that would be real easy with synthetic hormones. Funny how these adults start to turn green after they arrive in the States!!!
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"Life without risk is to merely exist."

Can hormones be (BLOCKED) or regulated?
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"Life without risk is to merely exist."

Interesting topic. I think the question is, "Do you trust the breeder to be honest about what he's representing?"

We have the same problem in the U.S. We can trust the breeder, or not. Personally, I prefer to work with locality animals or stock from someone who I know well and highly trust. When someone asks me what I have, I feel I need to go back to the origins of the snake and explain how I developed it, one step at a time. So, I believe in documenting everything. I prefer creating my own lines of snakes rather than starting with a variety or morph from unknown origins.

As an additional thought, I believe there's a lot of hybrids in the hobby, which may or may not be diluting the pure genes of some species, and I think it's difficult to i.d. hybrids a lot of the times. No offense was intended to anyone or was any one particular snake being referred to.

TC

"Interesting topic. I think the question is, "Do you trust the breeder to be honest about what he's representing?" "

Terry I don't even know if a person who is across the ocean would know what he is representing. Like the guys in the Green Tree Python market who want to know a locale of a given snake when there is no way for the average GTP to be tracked to its point of origin. The fact is most traffic (overseas) back and forth is through wholesalers and they just move animals without the slightest concern for where they are from. Whether it is ball pythons or rat snakes or anything else, there is very little done to make sure a given animal is what it is supposed to be.

I have been in wholesalers shops in Florida and corrected them on what they had. I also had a wholesaler have me name a local for a GTP because he had no idea where it was from. I didn't either but it was sold as what I said it was.

I am not saying there is a big conspiracy or anything. I am not even saying that the new morphs we see are not what they are supposed to be. I am just saying that the numbers of US animal morphs that pop up in Europe is curious to me. I am sure that there is one or more that is the result of a hybrid animal, I also know that we have the same problem here in the states. It is just a bit curious is all.

Later Jason

Hey, Jason. I hear what you're saying. It's quite curious to me too. Actually this topic has come up several times in the past, and it usually boils down to how much verification you need for personal reasons. Some people will only work with snakes they caught themselves, even. But in the real world it ends up being the dollars that talk, because most ave. keepers off the street are only interested in what the snake looks like and if it will bite or not. I think generic snakes are cool for the hobby, but I don't like crossing species. If that was all we did, soon there wouldn't be any species left (as was mentioned before)..LOL. That's one reason I like locales, etc.

Have a great week.

TC

Read carefully paragraph eleven under glowing rabbit the scientists coaching ours how to splice genes into eggs are from europe!!! Here is one quote. "He said that it was easier to give Alba her green
glow, and that he worked carefully with top European scientists to make sure that the
process did not affect her health or behavior."
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"Life without risk is to merely exist."