Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I read here some time ago that the W/S gene in Brooksi was introduced 'artificially'.....

Do you guys know where the W/S genes came from and can shed some light on the history...??

Also... What the hell happened to the price of these!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! A few posts down Rainer was discussing the crash of the Rosy market.... From the looks (prices) of things, looks like it's that time for the W/S Brooks....

Thanks gang!

byron.d

The prcies came down after they held at $500. for 5-6 years. Thats pretty good. They came down to $99. ea. at shows and on the internet. Its just market saturation. Peoplae sitting on 20 babies and not getting rid of them. I think the same will happen with the piebald BP's. Just not down to $100.

As neat as piebald is - there are much prettier ball pythons morphs. Some of the spiders I have seen are absolutely stunning.

In many cases, piebald just looks like an incomplete pattern - like an unfinished paint by number picture. I gather that's actually kind of what they are, leucistic patched (which, back on topic, also seems to be what white sided is - though in white sided, because of where and how it happens, it happens in a somewhat predictable pattern - the sides are white)
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3.3 L. getula californiae
1.0 L. getula nigrita
1.0 Boa constrictor constrictor (suriname, fostering/rescue)
2.1.2 Elgaria multicarinata multicarinata

Rainer. I very much agree with you. They held their value for many years - no doubt.

What about the history though...?? Can you give some insight as to where the W/S gene came from in these guys..?

thanks again.

byron.d

sorry cant find anynew ones on the c0omputer and email is funky for somereason here is the albino female still seeking a male brooksi of some sort

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geckorex
3.21 leopard geckos
2.1.1 crested geckos
2.1 bearded dragons
?.?.2 western hognose
0.2 brooksi
0.0?2 grey tree frogs
1.?.1 green anole
2 golden tree frogs
1.2 non-broken cats
0.0? northern 5 lined skink

I sold my Piebalds for $2500-3500 this year. I don't think they'll be below $1500 for a few years. Albinos hit the $2500 mark 3 years ago and are still $1200-1500 and there are a TON of them......and they are selling. I've sold out of pieds 2 years in a row. I held back 3 more females from last year and this year combined. Believe me, I'm not on the bandwagon, I just like some of the ball morphs.


Brandon Osborne

Brandon, the difference between you and the bandwagon is you have put in the years with the brooksi and colubrids and chondros, paying your dues at the expos and certainly on this forum. You have built yourself a rep and hopefully with the chondros and balls, you're getting some extra reward from your collection. I can't see anyone objecting to someone who has done the time in the hobby for working with high end morphs.

daveb

Dave, I have to echo your thoughts. You did so much for brooksi before they were "the snakes to have." I can only say great things about you, your animals, and your service. I'm sure you, like me, will always have at least one brooksi in the snake room. I still have my original white phase female....who turns 14 years old in 2007.

Thanks again.
Brandon Osborne

If this trait (whiteside) popped out of axanthic, I would think it popped out all over as the axanthic trait was reproduced. I guess there are a few sources of the axanthic trait, and this whitesided will trace back to one of those and not have popped out of the others for some reason. I do believe these traits are pretty well inbred. Who doesn’t have something traceable to Brandon Osborne or Tim Ricks or the few others you could name. We are all breeding related stock with each other at this point. It should be no surprise if you get something unexpected from these pairings but it will hardly be something new. Your stock may be recessive carriers of every known trait out there and will be revealed in due mathematical probability if you produce enough hatchlings.

I'm not buying it. I've been skeptical of this trait from day one. That's one reason I never got into them. I've been breeding Lemke axanthic since '94 and I've done several axanthic x axanthic sibling breedings, as well as breeding mother to son and father to daughter. I would imaging, if it was linked to the Lemke axanthic, as it is said to be, I would have produced one several years ago. I don't believe these to be "pure" brooksi. The first animals I saw in Daytona in 2000 didn't look like brooksi to me. There was just something different about the head shape. Just my opinion. I could be wrong.

Brandon Osborne

It is a shame that we do not know for certain. If this was from a black rat snake, somebody did a good job of selective breeding for the Florida king look and attitude before showing it to the world. It would have been a tremendous effort to pull it off and they deserve recognition for being dedicated to realizing the dream of it. That is my opinion on that. If this was produced by chance in a Lemon king x axanthic or whatever, it would be far more important to know the combination that resulted in that magic alignment of alleles. That is the knowledge that leads to other discoveries buried in the code. I wish it wasn’t such a mystery, but I can understand the originator using the knowledge to produce the next big thing before we can get wise to it too. Such is the competition to bring these things to market and cash in. As Brandon observed from seeing them at that show in 2000, six years later, they are 100 bucks each.

Almost six years at over $500 is a pretty good run for a common double clutching colubrid.

Steve Osborne sent me a picture of a white side in 1998 or1999, and I pretty much dismissed it.I thought they looked different (wrong), so I didn't buy any right away. I traded my way into white sides, and now that I had my fun, they have all departed my collection. Never was convinced one way or another. I had the same question as Brandon, after breeding axanthics for years, why wasn't I the lucky sob to pop out a white side, or a jillion other guys with the same stock?

Not that is anything wrong with morphs, I did them for a long time, but now I just have a hypo female and an eastern king male from crimsonking, and a white phase x hypo male that I produced this year. that is it (for kings) and I enjoy every moment.
daveb

I completely agree Dave. I have a few brooksi and a handful of goini and goini/brooksi crosses. Other than that, I've parted with most of my brooksi collection. I'm at a point in my life where time is very important. I just can't afford to sit on 100 baby kings, that anymore sell for pennies in comparison to the value of my time. I still have my white phase project and my sulfurs, but chondros have taken a little more precidence with me. I lucked into a great bloodline in '99 and it has treated me VERY well. Why spend time with 30 baby colubrids when I can keep one chondro that's worth 2x as much. Not to say I don't love my kingsnakes, but I love chondros a tad more. Can you see why?










And my personal all time favorite chondro.....that I unfortunately sold a few years ago. She's also pictured in "The More Complete Chondro" by Greg Maxwell. Said to be the best Hight Yellow chondro ever produced......and kicking myself every day. Summer

I can't imagine not having kings or chondros in my collection.....ever. Thank you very much for your kind words.

Brandon Osborne

I would kick you too if I knew that you sold that, hahaha!

Who knows why neither you nor Branden popped out a ws brooks king but that doesnt autamatically mean they are made thru outcrossing with another snake. Ive seen these Peanut butter brooks kingsnakes and Ive been told they are from Bill Love stock kings. How may people have been breeding Bill Love brooks kingsnakes and havent popped up a PB ? Dont get me wrong Im not saying Peanuts are fake just that if you wanna use the criterea of ocurrence frequency of some mutations then we can look at many other morphs as well and say the same things. On a side note I had a friend who had WS hets 3-4 years ago and they looked like Kingsnakes not anything else. The only thing I thought looked odd on WS (when I saw pics od the years ago) was they had small heads and if they were outcrossed to Black Rats I would think the opposite would be in play (ever see how big an Obsoleta's head is ?). Plus they are identical to those ws Speckled Kings Ive seen. I heard that the WS Specks are pinned down with locale data and a good history so Im sure they are real but that they look so close to WS Brooks Kings makes me think that WS Brooks are real. Maybe thats flawed logic but I would think it would take awhile to get them just right.
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Big Jack Bronson

Not really. You could have brooksi looking animals in 2-3 generations. The first ones I saw in 2000 did not have a typical kingsnake head. And in comparison, an obsoleta head isn't all that big when you are comparing length. I do know the history on the WS speckleds as I know the originator.

Here's a 3rd generation Anerythristic Goini X Brooksi. It looks like a pure Goini. And it only took me 5 years to get it.

Brandon Osborne

Sorry man that isnt a good analogy. You are comparing in your case 2 snakes that are subspecies to one another. They are structurally the same i.e. body shape non-keeled scales and a smallish head with a muscular neck. I agree your Brooks King and Goins King project looks to have given you a Goins looking animal but you simply changed the pattern of 2 snakes that are from Florida. Thats a far cry from breeding Black Ratsnake out of a Brooksi dont you agree ?
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Big Jack Bronson

Jack,

I don't think anyone will dispue i know what I am talking about when it comes to hybrids.

I bred a yellowrat/speckled to a hypo florida this year and the babies looked exactly like brooksi. Some had the exact pattern, head and body shape. All this after only one breeding. hmmmm...

Like all clutches, therer was a vaience of the spectrum. Some came out on the ratsnake side or spleckled side. But for the most part all of them would not be distiguishable by someone who is not used to identifying hybridized snakes. I can identify hybrids fairly well because I have breed a lot of them . I had a hard time telling if these were pure brooksi or not. Matter of fact i had to mark the deli cups very carefully because I have more supposed "real brooksi" (ie lavender, whitesieded ect ) that looked less brooksi than these.

Cool do you have any pics ? A better analogy but still you are looking at 75% getula and 25% Elaphe. I guess I dont know but it sounds like you dont know for sure either ? Or has Tim Rickes admitted to doing this ? LIke I said you may be right I dont know ? Does the Jungle Corn/king thing help ? Thats an Elaphe (Im old school still cant use Pantherophis yet lol) bred to a Getula. Did they have an odd head shape like some have eluded to ? I dare say I have never seen a Jungle Hybrid in person just some bad pics here and there.
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Big Jack Bronson

Posted by: BIGJACK at Mon Nov 20 19:23:50 2006 [ Report Abuse ] [ Email Message ]

Who knows why neither you nor Branden popped out a ws brooks king but that doesnt autamatically mean they are made thru outcrossing with another snake. Ive seen these Peanut butter brooks kingsnakes and Ive been told they are from Bill Love stock kings. How may people have been breeding Bill Love brooks kingsnakes and havent popped up a PB ? Dont get me wrong Im not saying Peanuts are fake just that if you wanna use the criterea of ocurrence frequency of some mutations then we can look at many other morphs as well and say the same things. On a side note I had a friend who had WS hets 3-4 years ago and they looked like Kingsnakes not anything else. The only thing I thought looked odd on WS (when I saw pics od the years ago) was they had small heads and if they were outcrossed to Black Rats I would think the opposite would be in play (ever see how big an Obsoleta's head is ?). Plus they are identical to those ws Speckled Kings Ive seen. I heard that the WS Specks are pinned down with locale data and a good history so Im sure they are real but that they look so close to WS Brooks Kings makes me think that WS Brooks are real. Maybe thats flawed logic but I would think it would take awhile to get them just right.

Well I just posted a long account of all this 2 months ago and i just finished typing a long post in reply but the electricity went out and all was lost on my computer before I was able to post (always happenes right when you finish) so i was not going to re-write it until I saw you post.

This is the short version. I am not going to check for speling or typos because I don't have the time to go over this again SO...............If anyone wants more detailed info (or they don't feel like dicifering my typos) they can call me by emailing me for my phone #.

the WS gene originated from Tim Ricks. Tim Ricks was partners with Chris Culallta. Chris told me several years ago that Tim Ricks crossed his lavender brooks with cal kings because it was a project they were in together..but I did not beleive him at the time because they were mad at each other and split as friend and business parteners and people might say anything when they are tring to hurt someone.

The Cullatas (aka Southern reptiles) also popped out many new morphs to the hobby at about the smae time including the hypo pueblin and others. When he got out of the busness he told me these were crosses hybrids.

I knew Lloyd and spent many a day at his house for years in the early 80's/ I knew his snakes and what he kept and bred. His axanthics founding animals were not outcrossed.

The axanthic that Tim said started the WS trait came directly from Lloyd Lemke. I know this because he sold the founding unknown het to Henry Dean. Henry sold it to Brent greene. Brent Greene was supposed to sell it to me but we agreed that I would pick it up at a show in Birmingham. I was late to the show and did not arrive until noon when Brent had just sold the axanthic to Tim Ricks. A few years later Tim came with a picture of the first whitesided brooks and said it came from the snake I was supposed to get from Brent.

I was in awe of the snake and wished I had been on time for the snake. But then Nobody else popped these out and they came directly from Lemke stock.

If the WS trait came from Lemke stock then there would have been WS's popping out all over the place like the hypos were.

Tim also was hanging around George Miskimmon (iriginator of the Whietsided blackratsnake)at the Orlando show the first year he came with his FIRST TIME lavender brooksi wheich he sold for $50-$100 whicle the hypos were being sold for $700 by the Loves and Beard.

I hybridized some ratsnakes into florida kings and they came out looking more floridana than . Some looked just like flroidnana and thats with 50/50 crosses hybrds. A second backbreeding or two and you would be getting all br9ooksi animals. SO that proves it not only possible but very easy to mask the florida king..

Tim also said he was freezing all his males the first few years of producing Whitesisded because he wanted to keep the maket price high and not sell males. CAN YOU IMAGINE ANYONE FREEZING ANIMALS TO DO THIS?? I later on put 2 and 2 together and figured he probably had some that looked questionable and froze them for that reason. Just like his half truths about the Lemke axanthic that he bought out from under me to gain himself more credibilty with his project.

the Peanut butter trait.

Its real. Not hybridized and not fake. Been around since the hypos acatually. Even came from the smae area the WC stock came from that produced the hypos.

Steve strasser bought some unkown hets from the loves when they partenerd with Glades herp. He sent them to a frind as a gift , out west and his raised them up and they produced a different looking hypo. He told steve and sent him pics. Steve told the Loves and they said the hypos have been poppping up all over from their w/c stock and it was just a hypo. So steve went to the expo the following year and bought up all of the Love stock unkown hest from the PB line. The Loves asign a letter and a number to all of their animals telling wheich they parent are.(anyone who knows the lOves knows they do this) so its easy to get the smae stock or unrelated stock if need be and they can tell wheich animals came from which parents and so on... The bred bred the same two wildcaught parents back again that year... They had these babies on the table and (steve strasser) bought them all for practically nothing.The Loves lost out because They did not beleive they were something differentas per his decription, so he went and bought all the hets for pennys. Steve also had his frioend send out the originagl adults hets. Steve sold the project to me and thats why i am the only one with the PBs and they did not pop up anywhere else.

Interesting info on the Peanuts. What year did he get his het babies form the Love ? Why does this mean nobody else got hets ? Was it a first breeding that made these Hets and those animals never bred again ? I dont doubt they are real like I said but to say that noone else got hets sounds far fetched. The loves are known for bountiful clutches I would think if they had a breeding pair of snakes that produced the hets your friend got then they probably produced more than 1.1 Back to the WS Brooks I have no idea there doesnt seem to be a sound history to them like the WS Speckled's I was just argueing the logic. One other thing Im curious about...Ive read on here that the Florida Kings have not produced a real genuine Albino...is that true ? Where did the albino gene come from ? If from other sources then how can the PB be het for Lavender (from your add I saw). Those Jelly's are very pretty by the way do they remain that color into adulthood ?
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Big Jack Bronson

Bigjack,

You ask a lot of questions here and I have adressed tham all here many times over the years. Sorry if this seemes rude but I can't keep going over this same stuff everytime someone new comes and posts here. Right now I have a 3 year old running under my feet and this all take a LOT of explanation. Most of which I will leave out if I start typing again (or the electricity will go out again, LOL!)anyway, it seems if i syart giving one explanation it will run into more questions from you as it already has.

Email me and I will send you my number. If you are really interested in all the histories of the PB, Lavender albino and T negative albino feel free to call and well chat..

If from other sources then how can the PB be het for Lavender (from your add I saw).

Here is what the ad says:

"The Peanut Butter is the newest mutation on the market. Its' allele shares the same locus as amelanism, and when one (Peanut Butter) allele is present with one Amel allele, the snake takes on an appearance intermediate between the two forms!"

The PB is not a het with amel. No hest are created as in a simple trait. It is similar to the Ultra corn (If you follow cornsnake genetics) its similar to the codom in the ultra.

Call me about the Peanut Butter and I will give you a detailed history on why I had the only ones. There is an explanation but since we are talking about 9-8 years of breeding and discovring the trait its history it long.

oops aI meant as in a reccessive trait (not simple)

geez, I am sorry I even started this now.

.........people, I sure hope you are not buying into this knuckle headed story.
Rainer, you are something else. You need to know your FACTS before telling stories about people, especially ones who are no longer around to defend themselves, but then I guess that's why you are telling this OUTRAGOUS story, simply because just about everyone you mentioned IS no longer around to defend themselves.

Very sad, very sad.
Walter Smith

The White Sided Speckleds are not identical to the Brooksi. The Brooksi can have a chain pattern on the back, the Specks do not. They're also much more vivid as far as the brightness of the white. If you actually saw the Speck in person you'd see what I mean. Also, the history of the Speck goes way back and no matter how anyone attempts to pick it apart they'll fail. I recently saw a white sided hognose. I believe it was wild caught, an eastern. It looks very similar to both Kings. I have suspcions about the Brooksi but it is not anything I have not brought to this forum before and basically this will remain a mystery unless something resembling another type of snake pops out of a clutch of Kings I guess?? Tom Stevens
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TomsSnakes.com

Look Ive stated here in this thread more than once that the WS Specks have an awesome history. Im not sure why you think I said otherwise as your tone infers Im doubting them...I dont, and they are awesome by the way. As for that look look like WS Brooks Kings I think they do superfically...just my opinion and that isnt to refer that they are better or worse than WS Brooks Kings.
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Big Jack Bronson

I did say identical and I shoulda said superfically. Sorry Ive never seen a WS Brooks King nor a WS Speck in person. Shopulda used different verbage...
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Big Jack Bronson

Honestly no, I did not mean to imply anything more than what I said. I do not post on here very often anymore other than pics. I am a bit soured from an experience with another morph that I did my best to provide ancestral stock photos and history only to get completely frustrated to the point where I am probably going to get the snakes out of my collection. I have some good friends on here and a few enemies. I welcome any new people to talk snake with. I am keeping my personal thoughts on my own site now, which I intend to do a lot of work on this winter. My main point was that thought the Specks and Brooksi are very similar, they're not identical. That's all Tom Stevens
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TomsSnakes.com

That is right, I do not believe just because I didn't do it that it is a hybrid, hahaha! However when a number of breeders worked with a bloodline for years and have done a number of parent-sibling and sibling-sibling pairings that greatly increase the probability of exposing recessive traits, you would expect to see something like that pop up in more than one colony.

It is "possible" that someone did produce another peanut butter- but didn't realize what they had and sold it as hypo, since there is alot of variability in hypos, or any million other possibilities. And remember, pb has not (or did not for a while) show up in females, so someone might have quit early when not getting the desired results. Or, just as Rainer said, his friend got all the hets. I believe the Loves' got out of brooksi before brooksi fever and before many of these double morphs appeared. Those particular breeder animals that produced the pb hets could be...anywhere. Or else, Rainer has them.

daveb

I want to thank bluerosy for taking the time to contribute. I think you have posted that info a few times now. People might not realize your credibility in retelling the story. I don’t recall anyone ever coming forward with any other information on it any time this has come up. I don’t think you could be any more specific except for this point- the snake that passed from Lemke to Henry Dean and then on was a male? There fore there is no chance of a sperm retention thing possibility with the Henry Dean part of the story? I know he’s a famous hybridizer and there was a lot of freaky stuff going on at that time. And I mean freaky as a compliment! (Don't recall any Andy Barr or H Dean whitesided creations, though)
Anyone working with Brooks can take some of the credit for taking the pressure off field collecting this snake that really has a pretty small natural range. The hypos are now down to 75 bucks and no matter what does pop out it will always be one of the nicest snakes around to maintain. With all the other morphs it makes no sense at all to try to find a wild caught Brooks that can come close to the quality of captive bred. You got a better chance of finding a python! The best thing to come from the Love/Beard/Strasser hypos is that the real founder stock is still alive and well around the old Miami Jetport and along the famous Brooks canal. Too bad nobody ever found an oddball Indigo before they were banned.

the snake that passed from Lemke to Henry Dean and then on was a male? There fore there is no chance of a sperm retention thing possibility with the Henry Dean part of the story? I know he’s a famous hybridizer and there was a lot of freaky stuff going on at that time. And I mean freaky as a compliment! (Don't recall any Andy Barr or H Dean whitesided creations, though)

The snake was a amel. Even if it was a female though, it would have thron hets. Tim told me he bred it to another and got WS right away which means it was a gene carrier. But his whole story about the snake is probably a farce because the ws came on the scene the next season and it takes years to start with the hets and raise them up and then breed them to get 1/16. I think the whole story from him about that snake is BS. He was working on this for a long time when he got the ws blackrat. I mean, he already knowingly did this with the lavenders, so why wuldn't he scam people with the WS trait as well?

Also if you notice the WS blackrat looks very similar to the ws gene at work in the brooks whereas the ws gene in speckleds looks completly different.

The timing of Miskimmons ws blacrats is perfect to time the whole thing when the ws brooksi came out. And the freezing of males...LOL, too much...

Just to clear something up. I bought a pair of Brooksi From Lemke. A male axanthic and a female het axanthic. The female ate poorly never grew and died within the first year. The male grew like a weed. I decided not to get another female and sold the male to Brent Green. I have been told that this was the snake sold to Tim Ricks and that it was the one that popped out a whitesided Brooksi. I have no personal knowledge of anything but the fact that the Axanthic male Brooksi was bought from Lemke since I bought it and I sold it to Brent Green. I have no idea if it was in fact a carrier for whitesided. HDEAN

Henry-

I know the snake was a male axanthic so there was nothing to clear up. ...Except my last post I had another typo. I spelled it amel instead of male. Had the letters arranged wrong from fast typing and it being late at night..