Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I turned back on a road last night and saw this snake come out and was sad witness to an 18 wheeler run it over 10 seconds before I could get to it.

It appears to be a t positive albino cotton baby.

And yes, I will go back and try to find another.

Dan

Really really sad....
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We are the best GALATASARAY

Very sad indeed....keep us posted if you find some more.
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Thats a rough one, get out there and find some more Dan.
Nate

that little one doesn't look like an albino, T or T-....i have T albinos and they are orange and white when they are young and turn yellow and brown as they age....may have been a hypo or pastel, but most baby cottons are much brighter than adults....

I was thinking the same thing. Looks kinda like a Hypo would look. Very cool looking baby though and too bad it's dead.

>>I was thinking the same thing. Looks kinda like a Hypo would look. Very cool looking baby though and too bad it's dead.

oh woe to me. Its not t albino though. hypo maybe

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Check the eyes!I can't see too well from the pic,however,an albino will have pink eyes..if not,hypo may be the answer

mike
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"Never insult an Alligator until you have crossed the river"-oriental proverb

if you look at the eyes of what they are calling the T+ albinos, they are not pink. it opens up a whole other debate over where they are albino or not. if you look at the cottonmouth gallery photos on my site, you can see several pictures of the T+ and they do strike a liking resemblance to this snake. the original line came from a male that was found in Montgomery, AL. Where was this Snake found?
Chuck Hurd Serpentology

This snake looks like a hypomelanistic to me. It is not the same as a normal young moccasin, that’s for sure. Looks like it would have ended up like some we see that retain a lot of the juvenile pattern as adult. Or maybe something more spectacular. Maybe you really do turn another shade of white right before that eighteen wheeler gets ya.

Several experts quickly identified the specimen as a T-Positive and its nothing like hypo cottons. It was found in florida.

Dan

What experts would those be ?

EE

Big bird and cookie monster.

Dan

One of the fellows owns these neat ones.

Dan

More cottons

Dan

In 1978 I caught one most similar to the third picture in your post of examples. I brought it to Bill Haast at the original Serpentarium and GAVE it to him for free. I told him I had a cool one that “looked like cardboard”. I didn’t know what hypo even meant back then, I was seventeen. If any can be traced back to then, maybe I caught the first one! There is notable variation in the examples, so hypo or albino, all these years later, I probably still couldn’t say. Mine was caught within a slither of highway 29, south of the Alley.

This is a normal…

A pretty good sized one.

That's what I thought. Sorry but as expected your response lacks credibility.

EE

Ernie:

What is your problem?

The last time we spoke, we were good friends and now you are here for who knows what reason insulting my creditability? What is wrong with you? And why would you even attempt something like that? Why not simply email or call and explain the nature of your insult.

And I never said it was T-Positive in stone. And if you doubt the credibility of the expert owner of all of those cotton morphs, then ask him for yourself. Or better yet, explain why this issue bothers you enough to stoop so low as to insult? The snake is dead, so what does it matter to you anyway?

We can discuss this in person the next time we meet.

Dan

well, my friend, i dont think we know each other. i am not your enemy in any way shape or form...and i hate to insult you or facilitate more message board drama, however, you posted pictures of 6 snakes total. i recognize 4 of them and there are 3 different owners to those snakes. i am certainly not calling you a liar, i dont know the circumstances, but if someone told you that he owned all 6 of those, he is stretching the truth. that hot pink snake is now dead, it was owned by a good friend in NC. he also owns that adult female that is pictured in the grass. that hypo is at a nature center in GA and that leu that is under the tree is owned by a friend in GA. the same guy that partnered with me to produce the first ever F2 copper x cotton hybrids.

But, as i was saying before, i do not disagree with you. i think the snake looks like what they are calling the T+ albinos, but its often debated as to where those are actually albino or not. with the pics you posted, they clearly do not have pink eyes.
Chuck Hurd Serpentology

Chuck, thanks for your comments and reserved and professional attitude. Well if someone who I ask sends me photos of those snake implying they have ownership of them and is one of the best identifiers (experts) of morphs I've met in 30 years or more of snake keeping, then who am I to doubt his word especially when I have gone over dozens of other snakes and he picked out things on the animals I could not even determine. Either case, I will eventually get around to asking him about the snakes as it was implied that he had morphs and there's of course no need to mention him here. Perhaps he is in partnership of some as I don't see why he conveyed to me he owned them? Regardless, I trust his eval of the photo and think of course you know the fellow as he is your friend.

Dan

well, my friend, i dont think we know each other. i am not your enemy in any way shape or form...and i hate to insult you or facilitate more message board drama, however, you posted pictures of 6 snakes total. i recognize 4 of them and there are 3 different owners to those snakes. i am certainly not calling you a liar, i dont know the circumstances, but if someone told you that he owned all 6 of those, he is stretching the truth. that hot pink snake is now dead, it was owned by a good friend in NC. he also owns that adult female that is pictured in the grass. that hypo is at a nature center in GA and that leu that is under the tree is owned by a friend in GA. the same guy that partnered with me to produce the first ever F2 copper x cotton hybrids.

But, as i was saying before, i do not disagree with you. i think the snake looks like what they are calling the T albinos, but its often debated as to where those are actually albino or not. with the pics you posted, they clearly do not have pink eyes.
Chuck Hurd Serpentology

hey dan, send me an email chuckhurd@chuckhurd.com. thanks.
Chuck Hurd Serpentology

You said that Several experts quickly identified the specimen as a T-Positive . I simply asked who the experts were . Your reply was big bird and cookie monster ? And your saying I insulted you. LOL

EE

Ernie: Heck, no offense, but you should know by now that I was joking when I said big bird and cookie monster and my intention was to give you a laugh verses draw a snide remark. And you have nothing to even say about my credit as I have been quite open and honest with you throughout the years. I thought you would know or have figured beforehand anyway that I obviously would not post the name of someeone else on a forum as it's not professional. I mean if you really had a true interested in their expert opinion or wanted to discuss/debate it, you could easily telephone or email, and of course I would put you in direct contact with the folks. Two of them are folks you know of, and the other is a younger fellow who sent me photos of the morphs. But despite that all voiced T-Positive within seconds of viewing the photo, I personally have a lot of faith in the younger fellow as he has eyes better than a hawk. And since you know I could care perhaps less about morphs and the snake is dead, not much about it matters anyway unless the sets I put in the area produce another or a new born het.

Dan

One of the problems we run into in the morph world is that there is no accepted absolute. 10 people could look at a snake and call it 10 different things and who is to say which is right? i wouldn't call this snake Dan posted an albino, but i wouldn't call any of these cottons an albino. lets take for example hypo, which is short for hypomelanistic. that means "reduction in dark pigments." i posted a photo some time back of a cotton that had no black, only green and light brown. i used the term hypo, which is by all means scientifically correct, but i was immediately corrected by the "morph naming council." seems the contemporary school of thought is, a snake must give off a completely clear and patternless shed to be considered hypo. well, i don't necessarily hold to that idea, but how do you debate it? i say the snake is hypo, someone else says it isn't and the two will never agree. to me, an ablino should lack all dark pigment, meaning pink eyes, ect. animals that still hold some dark pigments, such as these cottons, some timbers, and coppers are labeled as T or Carmel albino. seems to me there should be another name used on them, other then albino, as there is a long standing accepted idea of what albino is. same with hypo. seems to me the others should be called "clear shed" or something as there has been a long standing idea of what hypo is. the hypo boas have been around for years, that is an accepted idea of hypo, but yet they do not produce a clear shed....so, by the new school of thought, they are no longer hypo? i guess the point being, if dan and his expert, whom i probably should know personally if he owns these snakes, want to call this a T albino, then its a T albino, there is no way to prove otherwise.
Chuck Hurd Serpentology

First I know pretty much everyone posting on this other than C. Hurd although we talked the othe day and I invited him to the farm and he said he's coming. Dan sent me pics the night it was killed and asked me if I thought it was a t-positive albino and I said it might be. After all the term t-postive is used now days so loosely who's to say its not plus I didn't see it in person. I agree with Chuck on most things he said about the naming of morphs. This whole hypo, hyper, t-positive thing has gotten out of hand. One thing is for sure it's a very different looking baby Cottonmouth and its a darn shame it was killed. I don't understand the need to squabble over a unique, albiet, dead snake.....TC

ha ha, well, my friend. its not like it used to be when there was about 10 of us in the entire nation that kept venomous snakes. now days, people live to squabble and these message boards are a breeding ground for it. people will say things on here, they would not dream of saying in person. I sent your email address to Carl, he was excited to hear from you. I look forward to seeing you in April.
Chuck Hurd Serpentology

April is decent for duskies so let plan a herp trip.

Dan

i am going to be on my honeymoon, so i wont be able to spend a lot of time looking for snakes. i was recently turned on to a barrier island of the gulf side that is suppose to have the dwarf EDB's. I am gona sneak off to that one at least one day. =) but of course, we won't tell her. far as she knows, we are just going to an island. we are staying at least one night with david weathers and a couple with Sloan over closer to Miami. how far are you from those guys?

On the southeast coast but your right and better stick with the wife of else it will be a honeymoon she won't stop reminding about. Come down another time and we will find pigs for sure.

Dan

boas are a bad example Chuck, as the salmons are obviously a pastel gene...they still retain true black and they are co-doms with a super form....they also darken with age... hypomelanistic is a reduction of dark pigment,but there should be a consensus among all breeder that simple recessive animals are the true "hypos"...and co-doms are pastels...the ball python importers asked for hypos yrs ago from the african exporters, then upon receiving the animals someone decided they should call them ghosts, even though there is no axantic gene...there will probably always be confusion with what is what when it comes to morphs... Chuck you saw the cotton i got from AL...i don't believe it to be a true hypo, due to it's true black tail...it is the lightest adult cotton i have ever seen, besides the albinos...only breeding it will tell me anything...

i have read every book i can get my hands on about morphs and still have one question, and i even called Dr. Bechtel
what due you call a normally green animal, say like a green snake or green iguana that lacks the blue pigment?...the animal is yellow where the green would be, the black spots are true black(as it's siblings), and the pupils are not red...the pattern is the same as it's siblings......

and the t negative albino cottonmouth pictured is in a museum in NC, so we will probably never see any babies from it.... and as Chuck said those cotton pictures are definitely from several different breeders...many can be viewed at venomousreptiles.org under photos, then morphs...if anyone has photos of animals not yet posted, please do...i have a bunch there...

well my friend, i dont know why you feel the boas to be a bad example, because what you say eliminates my point. they have been called hypo for many years. they are accepted as hypo to most of the snake world, BUT.....the contemporary school of thought says they are not hypo. so, if my point was, there is no consensus as to what is "hypo" then the boa is a sterling example of that, wouldn't you agree? of course, there will be others come behind me and say i am incorrect, but in the opinion of chuck hurd, your cotton is a hypo because it clearly lighter then a average cotton and therefor necessarily lacks some of the dark pigments. now, i would agree there are varying degrees of hypo and yours is not as hypo as the one dan posted, but still hypo none the less. now, the morph naming council will not see it that way, i understand that...but again back to my original point, there is no absolute. its a more a matter of opinion then a science.

yes, but salmons were only really called hypos because the hypos were not yet available,but they were in europe....so upon bringing the true recessive hypos into the U.S. i wonder what they are now called, and they have no true black.... the black is a purple color...

hypo-melanistic=reduced-melanin not just reduced black

wanna get confussing? how about..."hypopigmentation-having reduced pigmentation" straight outta the book...lol

My honeymoon was spent in Costa Rica.....little did she know we were to visit about 5 Serpentariums and the herping you really didn't have to go out and look....the herps were everywhere. But I was reminded of it after we got home but it was more a funny-haha thing...."guess what we did on our honeymoon thanks to my husband"....LOL Enjoy your honeymoon together. Don't go out herping too much!