Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I just hatched this clutch the other night and was stunned. I am a die-hard line breeder and thrive on the "hooks" and "dogbones" I usually detect on my projects. Anyhow I thought I was working with a phantom or mystic line for a few years now, trying to prove it out. I ended up getting another animal from Africa in between my trials and thought it had a lot of similarities compared to my mystery phantom/mystic. I bred this new girl to my mojave male and got this crazy clutch. Anyone's opinion would be great!

Thinking about it possibly being a fire mojave?

To me that morph looks like a variation of a Mojave , which would seem logical since a Mojave was the sire.. I didn't see a Phantom like tendency in the sibling babies either so I am not sure it is a Phantom type gene your working with.. It is a good sign I think to see the "dog bones" and "hooks" running down the back , however I have seen snakes that end up to be just pretty normals that have some of that going on as well.. Like I have said before seeing things like this on the dorsal area is a nice thing to have , but I don't think it automatically means it is a Phantom either, a very important thing to remember I think.. I'd continue to linebreed them and see what you get , it may not be a phantom in the end but could easily be something genetic worth working with just the same, only by breeding it out will you know! Anthony McCain....

They do look like a Mojave or Mojave cross of some kind. Do you have any head shots of the "morph" looking Siblings?

OOPS, did not mean to post that pic obviously. Do the crosses or odd looking siblings to the crosses have a distinct head pattern?

Dave

One of the normals has a distinct fire look with two bald spots on the top of the head. Two of the mojaves have a very light coloration with extreme blushing. They look similar to the Sutherland's mojave fire they have on page 6 of their news pages. I did not think the mom looked like a fire, but I was banking on her being one version of leucy because of her look. I thought mystic/phantom, but I would have hit a leucy in this clutch if she was. I think it might be a fire....

I think you just have mojaves there; they are variable in appearance. Do you have pics of the mother, or the babies that look like fires? Here's a quick pic of a fire, a mojave, and a normal for comparison:

Same mojave, right out of the egg:

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-Jeff
http://jefflumanreptiles.com

Shoot me an email at Hoggwldreptile@aol.com. I will send you a few pics, with some head shots, so you can compare. If you have a pic of the heads, send em to me.

Dave

Here are some not-so-great photos of the mom. She resembled a leucistic line to me from the start, but I never took the time to consider fire. Does she look like anyone elses fires out there? She has some serious head blushing, but no circular or other geometry balding. I hatched out 13 mojaves this year and these two from this clutch look nothing even similar to the others,(including over 30 mojaves I have produced from my previous years). These lack the high yellow my mojaves are famous for, and contain some serious blushing. I know all mojaves have a tendency to include hooks and dogbones, but there is a fine line to me from spontaneous and gentetic. These hooks are abundant and the presence of the bald dots on the normal are all pointing to fires. However my het clowns throw head spots as well. Patience will be a virtue.

Actually based on the lack of blushing in the sides I would not really consider that female one of a phantom line nor a lesser complex line at all.. It is what I would consider to be a nice high gold normal ball.. Sorry if that seems a bit blunt but that is what she is .. I think you may have made a nice High Gold Mojave but there is no phantom genetics going on in the mom or it's offspring.. Here is a Mystic pic for you to look at , note the sides, the pattern , the coloration, and the head , hopefully you can see what I am talking about.. Anthony McCain...

I agree on the lack of phantom characteristics however I have decided she looks more along the lines of a fire or sulfur gene. I know I will never know until I breed son to mom, so that will be my focus. I jumped the gun on the phantom line because Ralph's original phantom "MDM" has a similar look. I hatch out very high gold mojaves all the time, the female actually looks more axanthic than gold in person. The offspring she through look just like the sulfur mojaves out there, not enough to really compare. I do however have a female I consider to be of phantom or mystic lineage. She threw a white snake with purple and yellow from a mojave breeding last year. Unfortunately the animal died in the egg. Her mojaves however are insane! I will produce the super in less than 9 months, so I am really stoked!

I have a Sulfur Mojave female and I don't really think that is what you have either.. Sulfurs are another line of Fire , when I look at your siblings they don't remind me of Fires.. Like I said I think she is a really cool looking High Gold Ball but other than that I think you are going a bit out on a limb thinking you have a double codom morph there.. If the Mojave is a male by all means breed him back to mom and see what you get, perhaps I am wrong as I agree pics don't show everything your trying to show us , maybe she looks totally different in person and if so you will make something cool down the road and you can prove your point then, until then I'd just skip on the naming it another morph idea.. Anthony McCain..

Hmm. I thought they had a lot of similarities with the sulfur mojaves I saw. I was paying attention to the blushing taking over the animals sides. Fires and sulfurs both reveal that blushing in between the pattern. The Sutherland's also produced a fire mojave last year, and again mine look similar. I know this is all pointless until I prove it, but I would never sell an animal I have not proven out. I have just been trying to gather opinions. I cannot tell yet if she is dominant or recessive but I know she is carrying an extra gene. That last picture was a sulfur mojave? I can see where you are coming from on that one, but she looks nothing like the Sutherland's cross. There is a huge variance within this leucistic gene pool and it seems new snakes every day end up making white supers. What I have gathered over the years working for Brian Potter and then going out on my own is that all of these leucistic snakes throw a similar feel in their pattern and genetic markers. This one screams leucistic to me, but I could be wrong.

YES , that is a Sulfur Mojave, she came from Eric Sandoval so I would say she is exactly what she is supposed to be and exactly looks like what she is supposed to look like.. The Fire gene is a codom Hypo so I am not sure where you are getting your info/ideas from?? She looks like a Hypo Mojave to me, just so happens that the Hypo effect she displays is codom and comes from the Sulfur gene which we now know to be another form of Fire.. Anyway, good luck to you finding that other gene, let us know if you actually find something there other than Mojave .... Anthony McCain...

That girl is looking sweet Anthony. I like seeing pics of stuff I produce, but then again I hate it because when they turn out that nice I regret selling them.

Eric

Thanks Eric! I agree with you 100% as I have that same problem with alot of the ones I sell too.. You look at them a year later on a post and think to yourself "what was I thinking selling off that one! " Take it easy man, Anthony McCain..