Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Well, in my humble opinion the Irian Jaya "Carpet" Pythons, are different from a true Carpet(think Jungle) python because of a few things and because of these differences I feel representing a I.J. X Chondro hybrid as a "Carpondro" is incorrect.

My main contention is body structure. If you have ever held both, then you know that Carpets are thicker bodied, and usually longer as well, are semi-arboreal but mainly spend their time on the ground, and are more prone to eating small mammals. On the other hand Irian Jayas, due to island isolation and evolution, have evolved into a more specialized niche, trading off their bulk in order to spend more time arboreally hunting birds, as they are the most common food prey item in island populations.

If you look back to Darwin, when he was in the Galapogos studying finches, he found several "species" with common mainland based ancestry, that had evolved just like the Irian Jayas into specialized niches. The phenotypic differences(visually observable characteristics) such as size, beak shape, color, etc gave each finch species/sub-species an advantage within its' specialized island niche.

Now you are probably asking, how does this relate to the Irian Jaya Pythons? Well, visibly(color/pattern)they are very similar to the mainland based Jungle Carpet Pythons, but in their structural build they are much differently adapted for survival, and much like the finches have evolved seperately and distinctly from their mainland counterparts.

But I guess in the end, it comes down to semantics. When I hear a snake refferred to as a Carpet Python, I think "Jungle Carpet Python", not "Irian Jaya", not "Coastal", etc. Maybe that is just my peculiarity, but I have heard these terms used generically and in this reference many times within the herp community.

Here's another example, if you bred a Super Dwarf Reticulated Python with a Dwarf Burmese what would the progeny be? Bateaters? NOPE! They would be Mini-Bateaters. This is a good example, even though it hasn't happened yet, because both dwarf varieties are I believe derived from island forms of both parent species.

So, in closing I guess I'll just say this, it really just depends on the phylogeny and the semantics being used, all else is just wasted time arguing. Personally though, I would feel that the animal would be misrepresented if it was an Irian Jaya X Chondro hybrid, and was being sold as a Carpondro. Also in my opinion, I would say that the animals described above should be represented as either Irian Jaya Carpondros, or with a new name which specifically describes an Irian Jaya X Chondro hybrid.

Well hope this helps, and if you disagree please post here again or email me, as this discussion interests me deeply.

Thanks,
Dan

This post was supposed to be below in the "Carpondro Breeding Questions" discussion there.

Please see post here:
http://forums.kingsnake.com/view.php?id=1064372,1064372

-Dan

Dan,

I understand your thought process but having kept many examples of both animals in question I don't see the major body morphology differences you are referring to...While as adults Jungles are somewhat more stocky, I have seen plenty of IJs that were sturdy looking and "ground dwelling" in thier appearance. All the WC carpets I have ever worked with were eager feeders on rodents....do you have any wild studies recording birds as a main food item? All the papers I have seen mention rodents as the major food item found in the stomachs of wild Irian Jayas as well as "New Guineas". For that matter Chondros were more often found with rodents in thier stomachs as opposed to avian prey. The island isolation theory is a good one, but we are talking about a island that is huge, mammals are as common a food source as birds...not like a small island like Chappell, where tigers (notechis) feed almost exclusively on muttonbirds or Queimada Grande where the Bothrops sp. have evolved a highly toxic venom to kill birds since there are no mammals on the island. I don't think that any special evolutionary changes are required for a mainland animal from Australia to survive in Irian Jaya/New Guinea.

As to thier arboreal habits, the jungles I have had, like the IJ's were highly arboreal until they reached adulthood (5-6') and then spent a higher percentage of thier time on the ground. More importantly the Northwestern Carpets (at least as pure a NW carpet that's available in this country) that I have seen and worked with were identical in coloration, body shape and habits to the NG & IJ carpets, this makes sense of course as they are the subspecies that are closest to the island.

Parantage should always be meticulously recorded and offered to customers purchasing hybrids. But Carpondro is a term that in my opinion could be used accurately describe any carpet x green tree cross, as long as species/morph/locale of both parents are noted and provided.

Also as to the burtick example...again a "bateater" (thanks Tom) is...in my opinion any Burmese x Reticulate hybrid. The "dwarf" races of both species (at this time) are still bivittatus and reticulatus respecitively therefore maybe calling them "dwarf" bateaters would be the way to go, they still fall within the parameters of what a "bateater" is supposed to be. Like I said before, parantage should always be noted for hybrids, in exact percentages, but just because a Miami Phase corn (a guttata with different body morphology and adult size) is used to breed a california king, the results would still be "jungle corns" just of a different type so to speak.

All these names are merely a marketing tool anyway....as with any hybrid exact percentages and parantage should always accompany any animal that is sold or bred...this is one of the main reasons hybrids have gotten the bad rap they have...it kills me when someone is planning to breed an animal that is a mystery geneticly. These animals should not be included in projects. If hybrid breeders were to police themselves, and euthanize animals that had the appearance of a parent species (ohh I can't wait for the heat I'm going to get with that statement) the state of hybrid breeding would be better. In most cases serious hybrid people know what they have and don't backcross (another nail in the coffin of hybrids) but the people the animals are sold (especially wholesalers/pet stores/etc) to will sell the animals as what they appear to be...if it looks like a Honduran milk, well that's what it is....regardless of fact it's 25% Floridana!!!! A great example of this is Leucistic Florida Pines....if people knew how they were orignally created...and, it's not the breeders fault he was 100% accurate and honest in representing the snakes for what they were...the person who ended up with the animals later decided to increase the value of these animals from the $50 originally paid for them, to $750 and coin them Luecistic Floridas when in fact they were a Red Phase Northern x Patternless Florida heritage...oh well sorry for the rant.

Good discussion

Horridus@aol.com

A correction as to the info I stated above....

Leucistic Floridas were also produced by a pure pair of pines....the father of the intergrades (pure mugitus) was in fact the het animal and produced pure luecistic animals with his female as well as 50% hets from the original Red Northern Female pairing....subsequently they also produced luecistic animals but I did not want to imply that all of the luecistic mugitus had intergrade parantage....

Horridus@aol.com