Reptile & Amphibian Forums

but that female still hasn't shed as of yesterday?

Shannon

let one go that nice (LOL). Michelle must be sick or maybe her cages are finally full. Did you blackmail her for that one (LOL).

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Rick
Never Enough
Reptiles

Yes I am sick...lol.... I had a hard time letting him go and letting the female go. My husband kept telling me while I was packing them remember you can't keep them all. If you are going to have to keep them all you will have to stop breeding them. He finally attached the tape for me...lol... I know i am a very sick women with a horrible addiction that out rivals smoking, alcohol or drugs.
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Michelle

Just extremely zealous about your Thayeri. It’s perfectly normal; your husband should probably be working on some more racks and places to put them. Have you thought about a room addition? (LOL)
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Rick
Never Enough
Reptiles

When we meet and got married in the 80's he thought the reptiles was a passing phase and i would grow up,I had reptiles when we met, then he thought once we had kids I would get rid of them since we had children in the house. Then he put his foot down to 2 snakes, so i guess i took it he meant 2 snakes per person and since there are 6 of us that meant i could have 12. Finally he gave up and when he thought it couldn't get any worse. I caught the thayeri bug. now he knows it can get worse, much much worse and now we do need a new addtition, just for the thayeri...lol.....
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Michelle

Then he put his foot down to 2 snakes, so i guess i took it he meant 2 snakes per person and since there are 6 of us that meant i could have 12.

When shopping. You are totaly cracking me up.

I had reptiles too when I got married. My wife is deathly afraid of snakes so she said I couldn't have any; it took me 10 years to wear her down.
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Rick
Never Enough
Reptiles

Now you are cracking me up.....lol....My husband says I have a math problem I multiply instead of add....lol...Glad to hear your wife finally gave in. Has she overcame her fear of snakes?

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Michelle

Most of the snakes are in a separate building (one room has birds, the smaller room has the snakes) but a few are in the house. They are not allowed to escape … ever … never! She does however have a little shovelnose snake she keeps in the “school room” because he’s “cute” and eats bugs. She talks to him, feeds and waters him but hell would freeze over before she held him (or her, never asked it either way).

This one's not hers but it looks very similar (only her's is chubbier)

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Rick
Never Enough
Reptiles

That is a beautiful snake. That is a start feeding and watering her own snake. I got my husband a tangerine honduran female a few years ago so last year i got him a male. He will water them, I feed them and once in awhile he will clean them normally it is me or my daughter. But now he says for my anniverary I will be getting a roll around tool chest....lol... As long as I still get the red and white leonis male from Dan V. for valentines day I don't care bring on the tool chest...lol..
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Michelle

He is beautiful, I love the butterfly mark near the tail. I hope you are enjoying them. Thanks for the photo update. The female should shed soon.
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Michelle

Michelle,
Yes I enjoy them very much.I really wish I still had some of the ones I had 12-15 years ago. Oh well,thats the way it goes.
These two are screamersssssss.Thanks,
Shannon

Just glad you are enjoying them and that they got such a good home.
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Michelle

......
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4.5 THAYERI
1.2 SPLENDIDA
1.3 ALTERNA
0.0.1 HOLD BACK RUNT ALBINO CORN
0.1.1 PYXIE FROG
0.0.1 MEXICAN RED KNEE
1.0 CHILEAN ROSE HAIR

He's looking great Shannon. He's already brightened up some too. I can't wait to see the female post shed. I'm sure they'll make some phenominal babies for you in a couple years.
Ken

Thanks Ken,
Hey man feed that hungry guy.LOL...
Shannon

Sweet! Is it just me or is this grey headed thing relatively new, or at least newly common thing. I first noted it in Dan V's stcok but I'm seeing it more often now and even produced a few myself last year from some newly acquired stock.

The gray face is something I beleive you see more in old school or classic thayeri the first time I noticed it was Tim G. had some advertised and described them as retro with a dove gray face. i thought he described it well so i bought one. I find now i look for the gray face. I find it appealing.
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Michelle

it to be a wild type trait that was bred out when selecting for cleaner, brighter colors but has crept back in the last few years; good or bad is up to the individual.
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Rick
Never Enough
Reptiles

Yep,
I remember having a few with grey faces way back when.

Shannon

Back in the day when I was REALLY into thayeri, I had a collection of 8.8 unrelated animals from as diverse breeders as I could come up with and there wasn't a single dove faced one in the group nor do I remember producing any. Personally I find the contrast interesting in in many animals the effect is quite attractive. Guess I'm not as observant as I thought I was! LOL

Tony,
Not sure were your lines were from but out here on the west coast they were pretty common.I had applegate,sipperly,Lemke and vaverka lines way back when and actually the dove face ones were pretty common.

I will see if I have some old pics.

Shannon

I had those lines and then some. Perhaps it was just luck of the draw but more likely without being aware of it I selected against the trait.

I remember (back in the day) three of my five Thayeri had “dove” faces and two did not; of course, one of the two was a black one. The black one and her sister, a very clean Leonis white with thin bright saddles and reduced black was either from Lemke or Vaverka (I remember both names but I refer back to the old and forget stuff remark) and did not have a gray face. The other three were from Bob Applegate and had the gray face. The drawing I use in my logo was of one of these, I toned the color down from the real one because, at the time, I didn’t think anyone would believe bright orange was a realistic Thayeri color; anyway, you can clearly see he had a gray face.
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Rick
Never Enough
Reptiles

The pair Shannon got from me are off of applegates, I found that out of 12 in the clutch only a few lacked the gray face. I have 1 old lemke female that i hope produces this year, will be interesting to see if she throws the gray face. Here is a male from 05' I need to update his pic, but he is a green gray with a gray snout. I did hold him back...lol..and several of his sisters and brothers.

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Michelle

This is his sister and she has the gray face. She is also 05. Even though she is tan I don't know there was something about her that still fascinates me. I know it is a sickness...lol..

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Michelle

This is the ole lemke girl. I hope she breeds this year, last year she was interested but the male wasn't, then he got interested and she wouldn't have nothing to do with him. typical male female drama.

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Michelle

She's really nice! Typical of my old collection. I tend to go for leonis with clean ground colors with either triad or "blushed" head patterns. This is one of my new females I'm bringing along. She is from Chris Bauble stock.

Thank you for the compliment on the lemke.
I really like that female you pictured, super clean and beautiful, I also love the earth tones her banding is so perfect. I haven't got any from Chris Baubel yet but he has nice animals.
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Michelle

Michelle,
I love the head pattern on that Lemke snake.Killer looking.
Whats a guy got to do just to get a "dove faced bat winged retro" these days.ROTFLMAO...

Shannon

A guy might have to swap some of them hypo still waters for a nice bat winged gray faced male...lol....
If his father hadn't passed away i was going try and produce somemore this year, but now we will have to wait till next season. I am going to breed him back to his sister who is an intermediate.
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Michelle

Awesome classic buckskin leonis there. I would love to see what she would produce when bred to a wild line thayeri either from your F1 line or from Tim Gebhart's F1 line thayeri. Do you have plans for either of those options in the future?

I am going to pair her with a yellow male from Sundial this year, Next year I plan on breeding her to a lemke X laredo line male. I was planning on putting them together this year but he is just not big enough. I look forward to it next year though. His father is a wild caught male and the mother was a lemke. Should be an interesting combo.

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Michelle

That is a nice yellow from Sundial.
Please keep me posted on the Lemke/Laredo X Lemke breeding you plan in '08. Something from that pairing would very nicely compliment my Vermilya/Gebhart/Hammack stock I have now.
2008 is also the first year I am likely to breed my melanistic Hammack female to my Vermilya males and I would likely be very interested in trading if you are interested.
I would also be interested in getting that Lemke female if you ever decide to part with her, although I'm sure you probably wouldn't.

I am sorry that is the lemke X laredo in the picture. Here is the sundial male.

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Michelle

Oh, ok. Well they are both nice.

np
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Michelle

Now see that level of grey face I used to see! it somewhat fades into the general ground color. What I've been talking about about is the stark and abrupt change of body ground color to a grey face.

like a blood red corn right?
Shannon

some are almost like a mexican bairds!

however, my theory is that the gray face is more noticeable now (in contrast to the body color) because the body colors are brighter and more saturated now than they were 15 years ago. There were a handful of bright ones back then but the “Vivid” (thanks Tim!!!) colors were just coming into their own through selective breeding. The gray faces that were barely noticeable then stand out against the contrast of bright color (look at Shannon’s original pic of the male from Michelle). Once you notice it, then you see it in all that have it, but before, it did not stand out as starkly as it does against a bright-bodied thayeri. My guess (yet another theory/hypothesis) is that the gray faced ones were selected out when line breeding for cleaner – brighter color because the snakes without gray faces stood out as being cleaner and brighter. The selecting out of gray faces may not have been intentional but a by-product of the individual thayeri that were used in creating the Vivid lines (ask Tim to get more than my conjecture). Now, as we have added diversity to the Vivid lines, the gray faces are showing up combined with the clean bright body color. I think it is pretty cool looking too on a clean bright snake but I am still mindful of it when selecting future breeders. But, I like the clean bright looks of the Vivid lines more than the “retro” looks (plenty of variability for us all to enjoy).

Of course, what do I know…

Without, with a little bit, and with

also, the pics were taken different days with different light levels (intensity). The first pic is probably the truest color reproduction, you can see how different light can effect the color reproduction with digital. Color reproduction has been one of the things frustrating me with digital, I miss my 25 year old SLR with manual everything, I could easily bracket a series of photos with different setting and pick the one I liked best. Now I have to read the manual everytime I want to change anything and by then the snake is long gone.

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Rick
Never Enough
Reptiles

I think you have a VERY good point.

What a cute little snake! The photography is good too. That grey face is a very neat contrast against the orange!
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