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I always thought that Dan Johnson did the greatest job I'd ever seen of showing all the data about his kingsnakes. I'm sorry he's no longer at it but the website is still up and worth looking at, even if you have no interest in that particular species. For any individual snake you can link to that snake's complete data or link to siblings, parents, offspring, origin and on and on.
Dan Johnson's website

That is a lot of work but very interesting website.

Small isolated pops. I think the alterna and Lichinura are two species that really need this type of lineage kept going. It really creates more interest for them when people learn more about their natural history and ecology.
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"Yeah ya told me, and ya wrote it down too. But how the hell am I supposed to remember!"

very nice design and animals....i would go one further from bluerosie's remark,to say i don't see any reason why captive specimens of any species shouldn't be kept with equal attention to detailed recordkeeping,really why not?i've never seen no reason why one wouldn't/shouldn't strive to know as much as possible about their animals,esp. if breeding them.......also i'm not obsessed with alterna like some-sure they're cool-but on that site i found those dirty/dark alternas the most attractive and ironically i see they recieved what appears to be the lowest marks in the 'quality' column.different strokes,huh.
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"with head raised regally,and gazing at me with lidless eyes,he seemed to question with flicks of his long forked tongue my right to trespass on his territory" Carl Kauffeld

Yes - I plan on keeping details on everything.

Something that might happen elsewhere but that I've only noticed in Redding locale - the cream bands are not uniform. They are bone white down the spine and then turn yellow at the bottom 1/4 or so of the sides, and are yellow on the belly.

I crossed a male redding locale with a unknown line lavender and all of the 5 young seem to have that same phenotype - maybe the white down the spine will yellow some more like the mother, maybe it won't. It seems to me that their yellow on the sides is more vivid than the redding locale WC animals (certainly more vivid than their father) but that may just be because they are young. The white on the spine though so far looks bone white. They do have yellow snouts which I can't recall ever noticing in WC snakes of this locale.

But anyway - keeping detailed records can maybe help up understand the cal king pattern genetics better than we do - even when outcrossing to get locality mutts like I did (they are AFAIK all L g californiae - but obviously are not locality specimens)

These 5 also had a disturbing feeding phenotype - it was a bit of an itch to get them feeding. 2 finally took rodents, the other three had to be started on lizards. One of the lizard eaters is now taking f/t - the other two, well, I'm trying pinks again as I type.

That kind of record keeping should also be kept. Some would say I should only breed the ones that did start on rodents but I disagree, breeders who want snakes with good feeding phenotype should ask the people they buy from how well they fed rather than assume people de-select the picky eaters.

There's a lot to be said for record keeping.

At the end of the day though - people buy a snake they like and don't buy a snake they don't like. Record keeping provides interesting information that may turn out to be useful, but probably less than 1% of snakes sold are sold because of the breeders record keeping.
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11.14 L. getula californiae (Cal. King)
2.3 L. getula nigrita (MBK)
1.0 L. getula floridana (Brooksi)
1.1 Pantherophis guttatus guttatus (Corn)
0.1 Pituophis catenifer catenifer (Pacific gopher)
0.1 Heterodon nasicus nasicus (W Hognose)
4.2.14 Elgaria multicarinata multicarinata - (Cal. Alligator Lizard)

Now that's what we're talking about. Great website and great animals. Too bad Dan isn't still at it. I saw a post yesterday questioning the purity of anery hondurans, and I know Dan was the founder of that morph. How could you question records like that? Thanks for posting that!

Brandon Osborne
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www.brandonosbornereptiles.com

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TomsSnakes.com

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www.brandonosbornereptiles.com

I only use ID# and pedigree info for my chondros. I just used hondurans as an example of how it COULD/WOULD work.

And for those that think their albino hondurans are cream of the crop.....they are integrades. The original albinos came from Europe and were not hondurensis, but polyzona (Atlantic Central American Milks). The patterns don't even come close.

I don't care either way as far as colubrids, but I cannot let go of 30 years of work on chondros. I just thought I'd share the idea.

Brandon Osborne
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www.brandonosbornereptiles.com

I believe hondo anerys are not 100% either??
:Mark
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Surrender Dorothy!

crimsonking.piczo.com/

Mark, what makes you think that? Not saying it isn't so, but just curious. I saw the original WC in the Vivarium back in the early 90's. Pictured side by side with another tangerine they looked identical other than color. The size, shape, and pattern all looked typical. Now you have me curious.

Brandon Osborne
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www.brandonosbornereptiles.com

Sheesh.... I can't really remember any more but I think Shannon referred to it recently in a post of his... I'll see if I can find reference...
:Mark
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Surrender Dorothy!

crimsonking.piczo.com/

....another well respected "milksnake" guy made reference to stuarti in this...
"....since albinos seem to be just something of polyzona x ??? and the anerys do have some stuarti influence as well, I would not call this "honduran" anymore at all ."
:Mark
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Surrender Dorothy!

crimsonking.piczo.com/

...this.
http://forums.kingsnake.com/view.php?id=1379594,1379686
Now I know zip other than what I've heard or read here or on other forums...so..all is not 100% fact obviously as far as I know.

:Mark

Link

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Surrender Dorothy!

crimsonking.piczo.com/

Did Dan start the Anery Hondos or Anery Gray Bands or both??
Tom Stevens
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TomsSnakes.com

Just for the record,....

Dave Doherty had the original anery Honduran imported in from Honduras,........this is fact strait from the "horses mouth".

so that's not a real mystery to some of the Milksnake folks.

Brian Barczyk of B.H.B. Enterprises acquired a few (hets I believe) from Dave, after a while of Dave owning the snake, and finally getting some offspring from it. I think it(the original) was a male anery.

about the same time Brian had some for sale, I saw some on Mark Bell's table as well in 1997, he might have had some just prior to that though.....but I bought a male anery, and a het female from Brian in '97.

Here is a pic of the male when I first got it from him, and a sibling from later breedings. I have lots of pics, but just a couple handy on file for upload to the forum.

best regards, ~Doug

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"Better to be silent and thought a fool, than to open mouth and remove any doubt!"

Doug, thanks for the correction. I used to get the two of them mixed up for some reason......I guess as I get older, I still carry my old habits.

IMHO,Brian is responsible for making hondurans what they are today. I remember when anerys were $1250 ea. and that wasn't too long ago. The good ole days of the price list.

Brandon Osborne
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www.brandonosbornereptiles.com

You're welcome Brandon,.........and yeah!,.....those prices were unreal back then!!,..today, everyone just looks at anerys, and they don't pay much attention to them AT ALL!LOL, but back then(as you know), it's what put Honduran morphs on the "map"!

I also agree with you about Brian's dedication in working with/
refining them, and so on.......he's a "stand-up" guy in my opinion.

Also, as mentioned before, albinism influence was introduced from "polyzona", I wish I could have gotten a look at that snake myself!!!, as those Latin American bunch are EXTREMELY confusing,
regardless of all the "so-called" meristical differences!!LOL
Really, in many cases, the more I have studied "triangulum", the more confused many things have become!LOL......sooooo much variation within certain populations of them!.....know what I mean?, within a given clutch as well.

In any case, seems like you pay great attention to detail in your collection!..........I like that!

best regards, ~Doug

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"Better to be silent and thought a fool, than to open mouth and remove any doubt!"

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TomsSnakes.com

>> about the same time Brian had some for sale, I saw some on Mark Bell's table as well in 1997, he might have had some just prior to that though.....but I bought a male anery, and a het female from Brian in '97.

Don't forget about Dr. Tom Harbin, he also had anery hondos as early as '96 or '97. Saw them on his table at the FIRS in Tampa. Ken

I could have sworn that this Polyzona story was proven wrong. It was only initially thought the first Amel Hondos were actually Polyzona but were proven to be Hondurans, not introduced from anything? Tom Stevens
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TomsSnakes.com

If you have seen the original adult albinos, you can tell by looking they are not honduran. Pattern is not the same. Look at most albinos today compaired to hypos and anerys. They still don't look the same. Triads are more numerous and close together. Just my observation. The original artical from back in the 90's called them polyzona and that's what they looked like. How many people are into polyzona these day?.....or even back then? Not many. Albinos became available soon after the anery was "marketed". Just seems to make more sense to sell them as hondurensis since they look close enough. A milk is a milk is a milk.....right?

Brandon Osborne
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www.brandonosbornereptiles.com

I never saw the originals and no one else ever mentioned the patterns looking different too me? But regardless I know I have Terry D's article around here somewhere and I will post what he said about this when I have a chance. Do you have any pics of the originals?
Tom Stevens
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TomsSnakes.com

Tom, I wish I still had the magazine the article and pictures were published in. That was 15 years ago.....maybe more. IMHO, the only reason they were later labled as hondurans is because of popularity. How many people keep or have access to polyzona on a regular basis? Not many. It would be much easier to outcross them to hondurans and produce a typical looking honduran over time. This was all back when a normal het for nothing honduran was selling for $125-150 ea. If you ask me, I still don't think they look the same as the anerys or hypos. Pretty snake none the less, but I think they are something else. Just my opinion and going on what was first put out to the public.

Brandon Osborne
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www.brandonosbornereptiles.com

If I remember correctly, the amels first appeared in Captive Breeding Magazine and yes they were said to be polyzona. They were produced from wc imports. Supposedly the importer got one batch of triangulum in and segregated them based on the nose ring, some being called hondurensis and some polyzona. It was all guesswork based on appearance and the amels came from the polyzona-like specimens.

According to Louie Porras they are the real thing. I remeber him telling me on the phone about all this but I never wrote it down. Just wasn't that interested in the whole thing I guess.
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"Yeah ya told me, and ya wrote it down too. But how the hell am I supposed to remember!"

Thats great. When you think of it, the reason some dogs are worth so much more is the result of this sort of record keeping.

In the last 10 years or so people have lost all sight of these lineages as they blindly pursued the next great color morph - and they had to tell lots of little white lies in the process - in order to peddle the offspring.

Lots and lots and lots of mutt snakes were sold by breeders (many of whom protest most loudly here) to unsuspecting buyers. Thats just not fair, and it does real damage to the whole industry.

How many of you would buy a king or corn snake from anyone on these boards and have any confidence that it was as advertised? There are a few that I trust, many I don't.

I'm getting email (and please keep it coming) from many people who hate where the few greedy people have taken this hobby. The clicks have to stop. Those who work hard and are honest have to have their hard work rewarded.

Joe

There are plenty of people on this forum I would buy snakes from. Any two snakes from different populations or localities should be considered a mutt in this case.

Brandon Osborne
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www.brandonosbornereptiles.com