Reptile & Amphibian Forums

My anery corn is about 4years old, I've had her from a hatchling. In the past 2+ years I noticed some of her scales were a funny colour and slightly odd texture, that I'd never noticed before (though they may have been there in her younger days I just never noticed). They are in 2/3 patches down her left side (none at all on her right) and they feel slightly different to her "normal" scales. At first I'd assumed she'd burned herself as I used to keep her in a viv with a heat bulb, but they never went black, have never shed out and don't seem to bother her. She's perfectly healthy in every respect and produced a lot of healthy babies in the past couple of years.

Her "weird" side and scales:

Her right "normal" side and scales:

I also noticed a couple of tiny red dots on her, which have also never shed out and were noticed a few years ago as well:

(over to the right in this pic)

Surely anery corns shouldn't have any red on them? Can anyone explain these odd scales and dots?

Your right, this "shouldn't" happen, but as complicated as the genetic make-up of an animal is, and how many snakes are produced today in the hobby today, greatly increases the odds of this happening. Many strange genetic anomalies happen with more frequency all the time now, there are also many different types of "paradox" snakes available too. Some are genetically inherant, while others being just "flukes" that happen from time to time. This sort of stuff is much too complicated for anyone to really understand, all we really know, is that strange things happen from time to time. I've seen many genetic anomalies ranging from mild, to WILD!....Paradox albino snakes with patches of dark pigment(melanin), Piebald animals with huge voids of pure white, etc... are just a couple examples of this.

The Bloodred corn pictured her is ALSO totally unexplainable. You know the term .."S#@* happens", well this is absolute proof..LOL!

best regards, ~Doug

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

Excellent photography!,........those macro shots are really great!

~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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Man, the close-up of that P/S blood is insane! it looks like the Diffusion of the bloodred gene doesn't effect the area of interest! looks like a pastel type of anery covered by bloodred! What other genetics are in this particular snake? sorry to get off topic, but it's just so wierd!

I've had red dots show up on snakes that are not supposed to have red coloration.
This happens somewhat frequently in leucistic Texas rats, but I've seen it in other snakes as well, and it's harmless.
For some reason this happens after the snakes reach adulthood (the spots aren't there during the snake's first and second years of life).

Tim

It's put my mind at rest, as I was worried it might've been something health related. Thanks again!

And that bloodred is something else DMong!