Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Just curious, since its been 10 years since I have had Brazilians, I recently Aquired a Beautiful Baby Brazilian after the first shed he seemed to lighten up a bit, and has been doing great...now he has finished his second shed while in my care, I noticed he is starting to brown out, and he is for sure not as bright and orange as he was when he arrived. I am used to working with Aboreal Pythons, and know how they can change coloration as they grow, I was curious if there is somewhat of a pattern with Brazilians, I have been told that they can start out life Beautiful then as they grow and get older(1-1.5 years) they can start to look not as nice, and then they after 2 years they can start to go back to being beautiful, like they go through a juvie stage of ugliness? (Forgive me for calling a Rainbow Ugly)Just curious what others have noticed with raising thier Brazilians, and if there is a pattern to how they develope? Thanks to all those who reply...

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Executive Reptiles
Amanda Kingsbury & David Kendrick
www.executivereptiles.com

Individuals vary, some will look better with each shed, some will get to a point then seem to backwards. The ones that are stunning as babies seem to always stay stunning, even if they lose a little, still above average.
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Thanks,

Dave Colling

www.rainbows-r-us-reptiles.com

0.1 Wife (WC)
0.2 kids (CBB)

LOL, to many snakes to list, last count:
10.22 BRB
10.14 BCI
And those are only the breeders

lots.lots.lots feeder mice and rats

Here is a picture of him when he first arrived about a month or so ago.

Here is a comparison, Granted the lighting is a little different, but he has darkened...

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Executive Reptiles
Amanda Kingsbury & David Kendrick
www.executivereptiles.com

Coloration certainly does take time to settle in. I would guess that stable coloration is achieved at somewhere between 6 mo. and 1 year old. This might account for your juvie ugly stage. A consistency that I've noticed is that all babies are born with saddles that are in contrast to their background color. As the animal matures, the saddles usually match the background.

After that it can change again. Last year I had a bright red female turn brown during gestation. I've heard stories and seen pictures of animals getting more or less white sided at different times throughout the day.

Picking a baby that will be a nice adult is sometimes difficult to do (not as difficult as picking a Green Tree Python). Out of the clutches I've raised up, the nicer looking babies tend to be nicer looking adults. Comparatively, if a baby is more red, or has higher contrast, or more defined outlines around the saddles than a snake from the same clutch when they are born, that difference will always be there.

This may be more late night rambling than anything else. Pick out what you can use and let me know if I've touched on anything insightful.

By the way, that's some nice irridecence on that little guy. I can see what you mean when you say he's gettin some brown in him but I wouldn't give up on him just yet
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Mike Lockwood
www.tooscaley.com

Got several of those, Savannah is my most extreme of them...

Savannah at around 10:30AM

Same day about 12 hours later, she has her nightie on. Look at the difference in her sides.

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Thanks,

Dave Colling

www.rainbows-r-us-reptiles.com

0.1 Wife (WC)
0.2 kids (CBB)

LOL, to many snakes to list, last count:
10.22 BRB
10.14 BCI
And those are only the breeders

lots.lots.lots feeder mice and rats

Thats amazing, Beautifuly Amazing...And that change is only in 12 hours? WOW..Thanks for sharing..
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Executive Reptiles
Amanda Kingsbury & David Kendrick
www.executivereptiles.com

yeah, in just one day....every day, she is one amazing animal. Her babies are fabulous and are doing the same color change.

I have several others that do the same, just not to the same degree.
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Thanks,

Dave Colling

www.rainbows-r-us-reptiles.com

0.1 Wife (WC)
0.2 kids (CBB)

LOL, to many snakes to list, last count:
10.22 BRB
10.14 BCI
And those are only the breeders

lots.lots.lots feeder mice and rats

I have seen alot of brazilian rainbow boas in the last 25 years, that is one of the nicest, I have ever seen!!!!
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Frank Roberts
R&R Herpetological
Roberts'Realm of Reptile Research

That always slays me, the prior owner didn't take good care of her!!!!! She's now the crown jewel of my BRB collection!!!!
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Thanks,

Dave Colling

www.rainbows-r-us-reptiles.com

0.1 Wife (WC)
0.2 kids (CBB)

LOL, to many snakes to list, last count:
10.22 BRB
10.14 BCI
And those are only the breeders

lots.lots.lots feeder mice and rats

Talk about stepping in [bleep] LOL
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Frank Roberts
R&R Herpetological
Roberts'Realm of Reptile Research

Any idea what causes this or why they've adapted to do it?
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Mike Lockwood
www.tooscaley.com

it looks really cool!!

I really don't know, may have something to do with thermal regulation, they are always light in the evenings/night and darken up in the morning/day
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Thanks,

Dave Colling

www.rainbows-r-us-reptiles.com

0.1 Wife (WC)
0.2 kids (CBB)

LOL, to many snakes to list, last count:
10.22 BRB
10.14 BCI
And those are only the breeders

lots.lots.lots feeder mice and rats

I have wondered as well. It seems certain bloodlines are more dramatic in their color change than others. I too, beleive it must have something to do with thermoregulation. It pretty cool really and Savanah is an excellent example of it. My more brownish ones in general seem to do it less than the more intensely colored ones. The Hogs I have do a similar thing with washed out greys/bluus that make the pink/salmon stand out more....cound be I am not interpretting that correctly.

As far as the color changes that occur during the maturity process it seems in my limited experience that they do go through an uglier phase. The different lineages seem to follow their own set rules. The offspring I have produced seem to be dull and pastelish while others I have purchased were more brightly colored at the smae age. The TF babies of 04 were fairly dull IMO upon arrival and have colored up more and more without going through the darker phase. A pair of babies I bought in '03 were fairly dark and brownish originally and then became what I considered less desireable and were almost sold off at 2 years then seemingly within their next 2 sheds changed to a copperish tone that I like. I try to pick lighter colored high black contrasting individuals....so far it's still mostly a coin toss for me. I expect them to get darker....some of them became more "flecked" and they have turned out to my liking. Truth is, I don't know what I'm doing and it seems that more than 50% of the time I end up changing my mind about each individual a half-dozen times. For me the final decision is being made at 22 to 24 months.

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When the student is ready, the teacher appears. When the student is ready, the teacher appears. When the student is ready, the teacher appears. When the student is ready, the teachers appears.

I had a Rainbow Boa of unknown origin about 20 years ago that used to do the same thing. It was uniform brown in the day and had distinct gray/white sides at night.

I remember reading (for some reason) a note in Herp Review (I think from 1983) that mentioned and showed the same day/night color change in Casarea (the Round Island Boa). I don't recall whether they put forward a hypothesis to explain this.

Here are a bad old pic of my rainbow. During the day he was solid brown with distinct darker spots. At night, his sides were pale whitish gray and his back stayed the same color.

I think all rainbows do this to some extent.

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Chris Harrison
San Antonio, Texas