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What do you think? I am looking for opinions here. I don't think I will really know the answer until and if I breed her, but here is my dilemma. I just don't know for sure what this critter is exactly.

The animal is question is the last photo below. This is all I know for sure: Her Mother is a Bloody Salmon. That is all I know for sure. Her Mother was bred for about two weeks when she ovulated the first time. That was November 23rd. Here is a picture of her being bred by a Jungle:

Here she is ovulating my first ovulation of the year and the first one in her lifetime:

Then I remove the Jungle and introduced a Motley:

Well he was all over her too. I got a visual on actual copulation too. So I know he copulated with her. I did get another obvious identifiable ovulation on December 9th. This is 16 days later. She had her POS on December 25th like clockwork 16 days after the second ovulation. Finally she gave birth on day 102 after the POS to a small but nice litter. There are definite Jungles in the litter. But what is this little critter?

Tracy Barker wondered if it were a Motley Jungle or Motley Aby. Tracy's first guess that is a Motley of some sort may be right on. My first thought was that it is a Jungle because of the lack of the complete Motley pattern into the tail. Now I am think maybe she is right. Here are all the other facts. This single baby was born with a fair amount of yolk still in the belly. Indicating in my mind a probable late fertilization of the egg. This in caparison to the other babies that have no such yolk. Further, the little girl has this connected pattern up front much like a Motley but not exactly. Motleys have a slightly narrower that typical head too, as does this one. Perhaps she came from the last ova to be fertilized and the luck sperm may have been one of those lonely Motley sperm.

I am not even sure it isn't a Hypo now. Motley Hypos have the goofed up pattern most of them time right? The Hypo colors are almost always muted as well. So is this a Jungle, or perhaps a Motley and maybe even a Hypo Motley at that?

How about a little poll? What do you think?

Jungle het Blood?

Hypo Jungle het Blood

Motley het Blood?

Motley Hypo het Blood?

None of the above het Blood?
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Mr. Jeff, I would have to guess it's a 'normal' Jungle Het. Blood, but what do I know and I don't think anybody will know 100% until you breed it. It's a cool critter nonetheless!

A motley of some sort. I think the pattern makes me lean this way and I would also not be surprised if it was hypo as well. It looks like some hypo in the tail to me.

Joe

Jeff,

From what I see, I would guess jungle het blood. One thing that makes me say it is not a motley is the lack of striping along the sides. That animal has perfect side medallions. I would also like to see the belly. If there are a lot of speckles, then I would definately say not a motley.

Matt

I say hypo jungle het blood.

But thats just my guess....I have to go look at HypoMotley Pics again..lol, but I sure see Jungle...so I would really have to go with HypoJungle....I just don't see Motley...

But I could be TOTALLY wrong...lol
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Executive Reptiles
Amanda Kingsbury & David Kendrick
www.executivereptiles.com

After looking at it again....I am going to have to go with just Jungle het Blood....I thought I kinda saw a hypo looking tail....but I am not so sure...

But I definately say Jungle....the hypo part is iffy....but I don't see Motley....
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Executive Reptiles
Amanda Kingsbury & David Kendrick
www.executivereptiles.com

I too think that it is a Jungle het for Blood. The sides of the tail look very Junlgish to me, as well as the pattern. I've seen other Boas het for Blood with color enhanced bodies which makes me think that it's not a Hypo. Is this a pre-shed pic? If so, lets see it afterward.
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Snake room janitor

There is no Motley striping on the sides so I would go with the jungle theory...
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Matt Lerer
'Ghi Reptiles'
Ghi Reptiles

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I'm with Trey on this one. The motley tail pattern is seen in Colombian hypos and is fairly characteristic of the trait. I just don;t see why it would be lost in this cross, if indeed it was a motley. Of course, I could be wrong, but to me, blindly without any parentage knowledge, I would have said Jungle, at the very least.

Whatever it is, its an incredible snake. Good luck with that holdback. I'm sure its the first of many this season.

By the way, did I mention that I can carry out paternity analysis on boas!!!! Email me or call me for more info. This will answer it straight of the bat.

Warren
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Dr Warren Booth
North Carolina State University
Department of Entomology
3309 Gardner Hall
Raleigh, NC 27695-7613

I really just dont know... but I had a little tiny boa born in a litter of anery, hypos, and ghosts. He was nearly that same color..... and after he got a few weeks under his belt his color changed and it was clear he was an anery. Sometimes the little ones dont quite come out with the right coloration. Whatever it is, I WANT one! Dan

Well, I'll stick my neck out here, but at least give some reasons. I think it is a motley het for blood. Yes the motley pattern got whacked by the hypo-but remember the blood boa is also a hypo and even though the mom doesn't have a crazy pattern her hypo het blood parent might have. The pattern on the back of the head is more like a blood boa and a motley-the pattern on the top is like a motley.

Now I can't tell from this pic if this is hypo or not-could you put it next to a definate hypo from the litter! The motley by definition is a very anery snake and that may be making it look not so hypo. Until I see some more pics (ventrals please!!)I'm sticking with my original guess and say that the hypo is making it look more like a jungle than it actually being a jungle. Or than again I could be wrong and it is a jungle-I just love red herrings! Tracy

No pressure Jeff, but could you please hurry up and raise that thing so you can breed her and find out!

I just checked the belly and there is plenty of speckling in a symmetrical pattern. Much like the "normal" babies in the litter. After checking that, I pulled a Motley to find lots of speckling on it's belly too. Another Motley I checked had no speckling. I thought Motleys weren't supposed to have speckling on the belly. Am I wrong about that? I must admit I have never looked for it before. The Motleys born here have always been obviously Motleys from the top.

I will take better pictures with siblings after a shed.

It is possible that it isn't Jungle or Motley too. I don't like that possibility but that is a real possibility. Whacky babies pop out once in a while and doing this combination, with the already sometimes known abberant Blood animal, may have just made a crazy baby that is neither Jungle nor Motley.

I really don't know what to think yet, but I am leaning slightly to Hypo something... Very strange. I can't wait for them to shed...
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Some of our motleys have very speckled bellys, especially from the mid way point to the vent.

I will go with the motley hypo het blood

I'd say jungle het blood. To help disprove the motley part, I'd flip it over and look from the vent to the tail tip. Motleys do GENERALLY have a solid black "stripe" here, but not always. The head pattern doesn't look motley, nor do the sides, but I have some motleys with similar side patterns. I don't think hypo simply because of the black around all the tail pattern, especially from the vent forward...I am no genetics wizard, but what is the likeliness that the male jungle and male motley fertilized the same egg to make a jungle/motley het blood??? So, I wouldn't guess that combo(think you listed that). The anterior dorsal pattern is similar to a motley, but I'd say it's a jungle before I guessed motley.

I am about 99% sure that two sperm cannot fertilize an egg. I believe if that were to occur, the zygote would not be viable. I can't think of a good analogy but I think it is only possible for one set of chromosomes to pair up with another.
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I don't think it's possible myself, but it was listed that Tracy thought it might be a jungle/motley, so I mentioned it. I didn't want to say it was impossible though, because you can never be too sure.

Believe it or not, the fussion of a single egg with two sperm is possible. These can be formed also from the fussion of two fertilized eggs or early embryos, or the fusion of a fertilized effs with an unfertilized egg. The result is two or more distinct populations of cells taht keep there own character, resulting in a mixture of mis-matched parts. Thus, the result is a chimera that shows characteristics of both sperm. It is extremely rare in nature, with less than 40 known recorded cases in humans. Also, these chimeras can breed, depending on which group of cells gave rise to the testes and ovaries.

Again, as mentioned before, a paternity test, comparable to that for humans, can be carried using DNA extracted from the shed skin of the potential sires, the mother and the offspring.

Warren
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Dr Warren Booth
North Carolina State University
Department of Entomology
3309 Gardner Hall
Raleigh, NC 27695-7613

i would really like to see post shed pics though.

I think another real possibility is that this is a hypo het for blood. I don't think it is a Motley but time will tell. I think this breeding is a great one and clearly shows the evolution of the Boaphile into a morph breeder.
Bill Kirby

I can't believe people think that this is a hypo. It is just a baby boa with a light colored tail; I'm sure many of you have seen this before. Once it sheds it will be obvious that it is a normal. There is no way that it is a motley. Just because the jungle pattern produced a few unique connecting patterns doesn't make it a motley. If you had never put the motley male in you would never imagine this snake being anything other than a jungle. To me there is no debate, but I guess that is what a poll is for.

If I had never put a Motley in, this baby may not have been born. That's the point. It's fun to speculate, would have, could have, should have, but alas, I did what I did and now I just don't know...
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I'm sure that it is probably more complicated now that you have all these varying opinions. I'm sure everyone feels strongly about their opinions. What do you think the boa is? You can definitely see the CA influence in the striping. I think it is a jungle because of the cream contrast outlining the striping which then goes into that uniform gray coloration on the sides. Of course, what difference does it make, its at least het blood right?

Is it super clean like a Motley's?

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Jason Gonzalez

http://forums.kingsnake.com/view.php?id=1505590,1505920

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Well... I just checked the belly and there is plenty of speckling in a symmetrical pattern. Much like the "normal" babies in the litter. After checking that, I pulled a Motley to find lots of speckling on it's belly too. Another Motley I checked had no speckling. I thought Motleys weren't supposed to have speckling on the belly. Am I wrong about that? I must admit I have never looked for it before. The Motleys born here have always been obviously Motleys from the top.

I will take better pictures with siblings after a shed.

It is possible that it isn't Jungle or Motley too. I don't like that possibility but that is a real possibility. Wacky babies pop out once in a while and doing this combination, with the already sometimes known aberrant Blood animal, may have just made a crazy baby that is neither Jungle nor Motley.

I really don't know what to think yet, but I am leaning slightly to Hypo something... Very strange. I can't wait for them to shed... Who knows?
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It is not Hypo, and it is not Motley. I'd put a LOT of money on that (if I had a lot of money to gamble with, lol).

Jungle Motleys have been produced, and it has none of those traits.

In my opinion, it may not even be Jungle. Hard to tell from that pic. Yes it has a neat pattern, but as everyone knows that is a small part of what makes a jungle. Lots of crazy looking boas that aren't Jungles.

The pattern could easily be explained by the Blood or Salmon aspects from the dam. Both mutations are known to mess with pattern.
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Gilbert Boas
The Boa List!

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It is obviously a motley thats pattern has been messed up because of the Central American blood from the female who was het for Blood.
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Robert McPhee
www.BBCExotics.com

Very nice though.
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Robert McPhee
www.BBCExotics.com