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I should wait until I can take a photo under sunlight but what the heck. See if you can guess the country of origin. These two are of the male. He was less squirmy.

John

Wow! That male is an absolute beauty! I was looking for a nice pair on the classifieds this year but I couldn't find any with perfect patterning, when I had the cash.
Gorgeous. Country of origin? Probably Europe...Germany?
Ryan

but what I was thinking about was can you guess what country his anscestors came from. Thanks for the kind words. I've been waiting several years for these guys and am not disappointed. What I'm most surprised at is their size. These hatchlings are as big as some yearlings I've had.

>>but what I was thinking about was can you guess what country his anscestors came from. Thanks for the kind words. I've been waiting several years for these guys and am not disappointed. What I'm most surprised at is their size. These hatchlings are as big as some yearlings I've had.
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John, are those Vietnamese mandys? Nice looking male there. Lots of yellow, wide black bands, cool head pattern, big babies...sounds like N. Vietnam to me, heheh!

Congrats!

Terry

You are correct sir!!! The pictures I posted are truly terrible. I think natural daylight will allow me to show them off to better advantage. But size-wise the difference is almost startling. I'll have to check with the breeder to get any husbandry differences (temps, caging, etc.) that may exist. Hopefully they'll settle in after their long flight. But if not I've become an experienced mandarin-coddler and will do what is necessary to get them to thrive (even against their wills).

I see you managed to get a pair of North Vietnamese mandarinus from "line one" from Stefan; nice! My male is also from this line. Unfortunately I'm still waiting for a female from "line two" (this line didn't produce this year)...

Regards,

Bert

Hi Bert:
Yes, my friend Gregg Feaster was able to import a pair for me (Thanks Gregg!). I've been trying to get a pair for the last three or four years. I'm very excited to get to work with this locale. They appear to be quite different from the South China and Sichuan animals I'm familiar with.

I hope your male is doing very well. Please post updated photos when you get a chance.

John, it looks like our (crappy) camera has broken down. Unfortunately, I don't have the funds to get a new one. I'm hoping that a friend of mine will come over soon and that he will bring his camera along (wich is alot better than ours), so that I can finally post a picture of my male. Right now he's in shed (again), but he's a stunner, believe me!

Regards,

Bert

One of these days you'll post them. It gives me something to look forward to.

But I'm not much better off. Not only is my camera crappy, but the cameraman (AKA me) is even crappier!!! I'm not able to get the right light level. I need light that's strong enough to show the colors but not so strong that it overexposes it to glare. A friend of mine who is more of a photographer says I need a diffuser, which is more or less a piece of fine screen. Well one of these days I'll figure it out.

Regards
John

PS Here's today's installment in the crappy photos department

John,

I have the same problem with the lighting. I always get the yellow colours overexposed. But I also find my male difficult to photograph because it will not sit still. Looking at the picture you posted, it looks like your male will become red as an adult. I believe that you told me once that you're colourblind; I'm curious what you would see instead of a red snake? Have you also noticed any differences in behaviour between the different localities of mandarin ratsnakes? The Vietnamese specimens seem to be more defensive than the Chinese specimens.

OK, I will contact that friend of mine to ask when he will come over to photograph my male.

Regards,

Bert

Bert you've asked a very difficult question. I believe there is a website that tries to simulate for a color-sighted guy what the color-blind see. From what I've read it would look very yellow and blue to you. What I call red is definitely not what you know as red. Let's just say that the red areas on the mandarin are "red" to me.

What I look for on a Sichuan mandarin is bright yellow and black with a light grey background with a minimum of red tipping.

I equate the red tipping with a darker coloration that sometimes seem to darken the yellow areas over time. This I avoid. That being said, I have seen some very red mandarins that even though there may be a slightly less bright yellow color involved still look really great because of the very high contrast of the yellow against the dark red. I would be tempted by mandarins of that description but they have not been my focus.

The viets are a whole other thing. Their color scheme is very different. The viets with the red are extremely different from the chinese red mandarins. Then there are the viets where the yellow gets white-looking which is also very different and to me interesting. But it'll take me a while of observing the color changes first hand in my two viets for me to figure out what's what with my opinions on vietnam mandarin aesthetics.

Good talking to you Bert
Best regards,
John

John,

Thanks for taking your time to answer my question. In mandarin ratsnakes I also look for a light groundcolour with a minimum of red tipping. I'm on the list for a female from Stefan's second line and this line seems to produce dominantly red animals, but this red is combined with an insane amount of yellow (you've seen the pictures on Stefan's website, right?), wich makes for outstanding animals. Nevertheless, I would still like to acquire a specimen with no to very little red in the future. I think that you Americans have (thanks to Kamuran Tepedelen) some outstanding lines of Sichuan mandarin ratsnakes with bright yellow colours and little to no red tipping. We really should get some U.S. stock over here; the Sichuan mandarin ratsnakes I've seen offered here tend to become quite dark as adults.

I really hope that I can get a nice photo of my male very soon. I also got something new this year: I acquired a CB 2006 male broad-banded red bambooratsnake recently.

Regards,

Bert

Someday I hope to branch out into the porphys. But for now I've got my hands full with mandys. Yes, one day hopefully some mandarins will be crossing the Atlantic in an easterly direction for a change. It would also be nice if a little more viet blood is added to the existing stock.
John

There are unfortunately not more than three different bloodlines from the Vietnamese mandarin ratsnakes (still more than the single bloodline of Thai bambooratsnakes, but alas). I would really like to see some new blood enter the captive population. I'm actually already considering going to Vietnam myself in the near future! Hahaha! We all can have our dreams, can't we?

I really wanted a second species of snake next to my mandarin ratsnake. I chose for the broad-banded bambooratsnake for a couple of reasons: 1) Bambooratsnakes stay small in size, 2) Broad-banded bambooratsnakes are easier to care for than mandarin ratsnakes are, 3) there are several bloodlines (I reckon about 8 to 10) of the broad-banded bambooratsnake in captivity and last but not least 4) all broad-banded bambooratsnakes in captivity come from the same locality in Malaysia. Add to that the fact that we're talking here about another beautiful species of ratsnake, so the choice was easily made. My male has already fed twice on frozen/thawed babymice without a problem (I just have to wiggle the mouse in front of him with a pincet), so I'm already loving it! The snake is, however, more feisty than my mandarin ratsnake, but I think that it will become more calm as time progresses.

Bert:
The laticincta truly are beautiful. I'm sure you'll enjoy them greatly (although I don't know if they will become calm, I've heard they can be nervous).

Enjoy
John

John,

We shall see how far gentle handling will bring me. Right now the snake is just so small that it totally freaks out whenever it sees my 'large' hands approach it. But I'm already glad that it feeds on frozen/thawed prey!

Regards,

Bert

Those are beautiful John. I wish that locality would become more available in the US. I'd like to get a pair or two myself. Randy W.

Thanks Randy. I also hope that more viets are imported. But the way things are now the only place I've seen them is Germany. I guess in a few years another generation will be ready to breed and the numbers will increase.

Regards
John

Congrats John!! He's incredible. Is the female as nice?

Jeff

Yes she's really pretty too. I'll try and get some good photos this weekend.

Regards
John