Reptile & Amphibian Forums

This has been an area frustration for me for a bit, please excuse me while I vent! It is true that many people have come up with some outstanding pale white geckos with black spots, none of these geckos are truly snows! As with all other genetic morphs, snow is a result of crossing an Axanthic with an Albino, Axanthic is without yellow and albino is without melanin. These two traits combined will produce a true "snow" leopard gecko. It seems that many people in the gecko breeding community have just tried to bypass what others reptile breeders have had to endure. The true genetic morphs take time to establish and sometimes, very hard work. The people that have these "snow" leopard geckos have even come up with a grading system A grade, B grade, etc., almost all of these animals turn into different colored geckos by the time adulthood comes along. I think for people working with "snows" they would do themselves better to take there pale white animals and cross them with albinos make double hets and then produce true snow leopards. If you need further genetic proof of these crosses, snow corn is axanthic X albino, snow ball is a axanthix X albino and so on! This is open to debate, if anyone wishes.

. . . I guess I just learned from seeing other people post "grade, c, b and a snows".

So much for the internet, huh?

I agree with you on "snows" on the market today. I'm very skeptical of them - in fact, I was offered some serious money for a baby that looked "Snowy" - but turned very normal looking 2 months later. I by-passed a few sales, just because I have a hard enough time sleeping, without losing sleep over a dude who buys a gecko from me and it turns normal looking.

Thanks for the info.
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Monte Meyer
Updated Powergeckos
Email

Mealworms . . . .you can't eat just one

Morphs such as "Hypo" in leopard geckos are not simple recessives as they are in snakes.

You need to have a different mindset, until we do see a genetic axanthic, anery, hypo, etc... many leopard gecko traits are simply line bred, which has led to the grading system (which i don't agree with any more than you do, but its the easiest way to explain it to casual hobbiests I suppose)

>>. . . I guess I just learned from seeing other people post "grade, c, b and a snows".
>>
>>So much for the internet, huh?
>>
>>I agree with you on "snows" on the market today. I'm very skeptical of them - in fact, I was offered some serious money for a baby that looked "Snowy" - but turned very normal looking 2 months later. I by-passed a few sales, just because I have a hard enough time sleeping, without losing sleep over a dude who buys a gecko from me and it turns normal looking.
>>
>>Thanks for the info.
>>-----
>>Monte Meyer
>> Updated Powergeckos
>>Email
>>
>>Mealworms . . . .you can't eat just one
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Steven Beckerman
E2MacPets

Monte, we understand your concern about selling snows that might not look like snows as they age, but you should keep up the good work. The work that you're doing with your geckos is outstanding. We enjoy looking at your pictures and posts.
All we are trying to do is make the suggestion that people should be aware that there are no true snow leopard geckos yet.

The same thing happened with the patternless leopard geckos quite some time ago. Everyone was calling them leucistic (and some people still do) when in fact they are not leucistic at all.

We have received multiple emails inquiring about purchasing these animals (snows) and that is what prompted this post. Since there are very few proven genetic morphs at this time, and many of these characteristics have been created from line breeding leopard geckos, it seems incredibly short sighted for the future of leopard geckos/gecko sales to give them these inaccurate names. In the future, people that actually do spend the time to produce these morphs will be hurt because of these inaccurate names that have been created for leopard geckos by breeders merely to generate more revenue at this moment.

I think the whole naming thing is way out of hand and should be standardized. As compared to other reptiles(which are a little better with the naming thing), a "snow" leopard gecko should be referred to as axanthic, a "blizzard" should be leucistic, and a "blazing blizzard" should be snow. It seems like everybody and their brother wants to slap a new name on the slightest color anomaly just to up their profit margin.

a snow should be axathic x albino. a blazzing blizzard is the result of a blizzard .... white animal with black or blue eyes(leusistic, if you may) and an albino. i know in boas and pythons this has never been produced and i dont think a leusistic corn snake has ever been documented.. therefor whomever produces blizzard x albino can call it whatever they wish.
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-robin day
Geckoheads And Geeks

what about leusistic albino texas rat snakes? thats simply what theyre called. the name is a little long, and blazing blizzard is a fun name. some morphs though are funny cos' theyre not really morphs.

I realize that a blazing blizzard is not the equivalent of a snow snake genetically. I guess I was referring more to appearance(totally white with red eyes) as an animal that is totally devoid of any pigment. Since there are certain pigmental differences, exact morphs from snakes to geckos may differ a little, but describing a blazing blizzard as a snow would certainly have been more in line with other reptile morphs than what we currently call a snow.

You know thats exactly right. I had never really thought about the way it was being used with leopard geckos. Thats an excellent point. Actually its not even a point. Its just the plain truth! Just another example of something in the future maybe to look forward to. Thanks for the post.

Although I do agree with most of what you said I forgot about the statement of making double hets. I don't think the snows are actually true axanthics and therefore not a simple recessive gene. Specially considering most of the snows I have seen have some yellow. When we get true axanthics then we can get working on some double hets!

Laura,
i agree completely. do you think that maybe what people are calling "snows" are actually some form of axanthic? when born alot look axanthic but then turn normal or yellow out. however its the same in boa constrictors and ball pythons. it is just now ,after several years of breedings, that a true black and white and grey adult animal is becoming more commonly seen.
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-robin day
Geckoheads And Geeks

The 'snow' that I know of is selective bred. Breeding animals with less yellow to animals with more less yellow. But people place names like snow and tang on to animals that arn't that much different from normal. It doesn't matter what they are actually called as long everyone know what animal you are talking about right?

DON'T ASSUME THE NAME OF A MORPH MEANS THE SAME THING IN DIFFERENT SPECIES!!

Yes, and albino axanthic being called a snow is true..... for snakes. The idea of "snow" leopard geckos has been around just as long as high-yellows... which was way before the first genetic snow snake was produced. It just so happened that when people named the snake morph, they named it the same thing as the developing leopard gecko morph. Genetic axanthic leopard geckos have not been discovered so there is no way to make this genetic snow in leopard geckos. Your statement should include blizzards in your snake nomenclature, as they would actually be the snake equivalent of leucistic, but I don't hear you commenting on that.

The "snow" LEOPARD GECKO is a slectively bred trade for a white background with solid black spots.... just like high yellows and tangerines are yellow or orange backgrounds with black spots. These animals are born pure white and black, and the best stay that way. Those are "A" grades. "B" grades are those who developed lavendar and possibly some yellowishness as adults. "C" grades are born black and white but turn into pastels as adults. These animals should come from parents that are black and white or are from snow bloodlines, not just the occassional light juvie that appears. While this idea has been around for so long, breeding out the tan backgrounds has some harder than breeding more of the yellow and then orange in,and with not as many breeders in on the project snows have always been rare, but especially these days. A lot of people are looking to get into the morph again which has led to almost any baby gecko that is lighter than its siblings being called a snow (just like many geckos with orange on the tails being called a carrot tail which isn't true by any means).

While it would be nice for all the genetic morphs and their combinations in reptiles to be labled the same thing, it isn't going to happen so don't come in here spouting "this is the way it is" when those rules don't apply to everything.

I posted a message some times ago about the same thing, one of my babies was born white with black bands and now he is very pale off white with black spots. He is out of lines with high yellows and they have never been bred for "snows" and he is born here in Sweden and his line is Swedish for several generations. Next year I plan to mate him to his mother, a very nice high yellow female that have some good high yellow babies.
What I understand is that you have to have some sort of "snow-graded" parents to get "snow", but my "snow" has very high yellow parents. Please, explane to me how that can happened.

Its all random at first... then when you line bred you increase homozygosity and start seeing the desired trait.
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-Ross Payan - www.LeosAnonymous.com

Leos Anonymous

Red Striped Tangerines, Carrot Tails and Screaming Amel Fat-Tails

"As with all other genetic morphs, snow is a result of crossing an Axanthic with an Albino, Axanthic is without yellow and albino is without melanin.If you need further genetic proof of these crosses, snow corn is axanthic X albino, "

I agree with you that the grading system is wrong but it is a good way to help a newcomer understand that snows are line bred thus far in leos.

however, I would like to know where you get that a snow is a cross between an axanthic and an albino in snakes???? In corn snakes there really is no such thing as axanthic being a trait, it is more of a co dominant. The closest thing we have are charcoal corns which lack most but not always all yellow. The true cross to produce snows in the F2 generation is albino(amelanistic)x anerythristic(type A) anerys lack red pigments. this gives you a true genetic snow in the corn snake world. pictured above is my snow and they do not lack yellow.

Another thing which was mentioned was that Blizzards were the leucistics in the snake world. that is absolutley untrue. Leucism has not been found in corns but has been found, as mentioned, in texas rats. Blizzard corns are a double recessive from crossing an albino(amel)x a charcoal(anerythristic type B). this gives you true genetic blizzards which are mostly white with a barely noticeable pattern and little to no yellow. I hope i made sense

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~~~Amy~~~
my zoo LOL
corns
1.0 amber(?)-Phoenix 1.0 sunglow motley-Eli 1.0 hypomelanistic-Tadrith 1.0 ghost-Alex(kinked) 0.1 charcoal-Siva 0.1 caramel het butter-Kilowea 0.1 snow-Zhaneel 0.0.1 butter-Xanthe
leopard geckos
1.0 hypo tang-Pablo 0.1 normal-Valentine
others
1.1 dauchshunds 1.0 cat 0.1 wolf spider 2many.2many mice