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Finally got around to trying to get pics of the little wigglers! These are the best out of the litter of 15. All are now feeding on unscented pinky parts (all but two never needed scenting).

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Brad Chambers
WWW.HCU-TX.ORG

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congrats!!! Are these guys from a hypo x hypo pairing?

No-Hypo X normal-the entire litter was 15. I beat the odds though, since there were only a very few "normals"...
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Brad Chambers
WWW.HCU-TX.ORG

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can you post a pic of each or a side by side?i just cant see it.they look just like the normals i get from het X ALBINO.all normals are co-dom/dom.sorry i just see real nice checkereds.
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ball pythons
garter snake morphs easterns/checkereds/floridas/redsides
western hognose
1.1 super kids Memfis Lance and Linda May(co-dom)

Lee-

I agree that I myself was a bit disappointed in the subtle difference between the two when they were first born-but once they shed the difference is noticeable, and from what I am told it increases as they age (which I am seeing already). Please keep in mind that these babies are only about ten days old-even the best selectively bred normals would be hard-pressed to show this much color so early.

I used to have a gorgeous pair of greenish checkereds from the northern hill country, yet even their babies took several sheds to show any nice greens whatsoever...As I told Scott, I'll post comparison pics when she drops her next litter (if no one else does before then)...
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Brad Chambers
WWW.HCU-TX.ORG

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Brad,

Congrats on the litter ! Would be interested in seeing a shot of the normals and hypo babies together too.

Scott
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Albino Garter Snake

I had a little accident with the normals in this litter-as soon as they shed, I separated them out, with the hypos going in to separate Reptile Basics hatchling drawers, while the normals went into a shoebox unit together. This unit was not as tight as I thought-all the normals had escaped by morning and are probably out enjoying the Hill Country environment as we speak!

Here is a pic of the hypo female and her mate-a locally-collected normal male. He's actually a very nice checkered for this area, but you can see he can't compare to the hypo. I agree that at birth the difference is not incredibly pronounced (like, for example, the granites or albinos), but you can definitely see it-more so in person (One was taken in sunlight, the other with flash-but you can get the gist).

I'll post side-by-side pics when she drops her second litter in a few weeks.

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Brad Chambers
WWW.HCU-TX.ORG

The Avalanche has already started-it is too late for the pebbles to vote....

Congrats Brad, on a fine looking litter.
I said this last year and I will say it again, I don't think hypo is a good term for this snake (not to mention it is grossly overused in the reptile industry) but rather it looks like this snake has an increase in color pigment, specifically the yellows but maybe even an increase also in melanin as the black checkers even appear darker and bolder, so using hypo which=reduction is really the wrong term completely. Hypererythristic or "high yellow" or "pastel" would seem more appropriate.
Also, I'm not sure that the genetics have really been properly proven out that this is truely a single co-dom gene, rather than just a nice colored locality variant that that passes this coloration on to it's offspring with a somewhat dominating effect over the usual, normal wild type. Either way these are just my oppinions, so take it for what it's worth.
Again congrats to you either way for producing the nice looking litter Brad, they are pretty and I see the difference albiet suttle, and not meaning anything toward you personally, just the name and genetics describing the snake.
Jeff
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Jeff Benfer
gartersnakemorph.com

No worries Jeff-I agree with you that "pastel" might even be a better term. The comparison with Pastel ball pythons is apt, in that there is some variability to this trait, and just as in pastel balls, a very dark one might easily be mistaken for a nicely-colored normal.

Here is a better comparison between the members of this pairing-the male is wild-caught, so I had to snap this quickly as he tends to be a "runner" -unfortunately this pic still fails to capture the intensity of the hypo's green ...

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Brad Chambers
WWW.HCU-TX.ORG

The Avalanche has already started-it is too late for the pebbles to vote....

I do agree that hypo may not be the best term for this snake, but i have to confirm that in person, these snakes blow you away with the brightness/contrast that they exhibit. The black checks are superbly black, I know that all checkereds have black checks, but this is a whole 'nother shade of black. and the green parts of the snake are LIME freaking green! It kind of, in a way, hurts your eyes to look at! It's a very weird contrast, it looks un-natural, but if you saw it in a bin of normals you would grab it on the spot. I also noticed they have a distinct looking head/facial pattern. Put it this way, if you mixed them in with a bin of nice looking normals, I would be able to pick them all out rather quickly! This is one of those subtle morphs that you have to see in person to really appreciate!

One thing I just noticed in that picture of the adults is that the eyes of the male appear to be more red, so it is possible that the morph is a reduction of xanthin that "cleans up" the brownish-yellow to bright yellow, and the dark brown checkers to a cleaner black with a reduction of the already normally low reds from xanthin in the wild type. The cleaner look could actually be the result of reduction of both xanthin and melanin. It's really difficult to call (guess) due to the fact that the base wild type of the checkered is primarily yellows, browns, and black to begin with, and it's not a really dramatic color change.
So it looks like you had 8 out of 15 that were "hypo". Those ratios would point to dom or co-dom, but it would be nice to see that ratio reproduced in several different litters.
Has there been a sib to sib or offspring back to parent breeding to see if there is a visually different homozygous form, or even if there is not a visual homozygous, the ratios of the offspring should change from 1/2 to appox 3/4?
Also is a triple combo of "hypo", abino, granite in the works? It would be very interesting to see all of those results.
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Jeff Benfer
gartersnakemorph.com

Jeff-

I don't know the answer to some of your questions. I do know that there have been several litters of these guys at least, and the results have led others (not me-this is my first litter, and actually the ratio was 8 out of 15 hypos) to call it a dom/codom mode of inheritance. No super has yet been produced to my knowledge. I'll be attempting the hypo-hypo breeding next Spring, though I'm sure i won't be the first!
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Brad Chambers
WWW.HCU-TX.ORG

The Avalanche has already started-it is too late for the pebbles to vote....

It will be interesting to see those results, certainly has a lot of potiential. Best of luck with it.
Do you see a difference in eye color, or is it just the photo?
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Jeff Benfer
gartersnakemorph.com

there does seem to be a difference, but it isn't "night and day"-I'll pay more attention to that trait in future.
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Brad Chambers
WWW.HCU-TX.ORG

The Avalanche has already started-it is too late for the pebbles to vote....

I have actually been wondering about the "hypo" X albino cross. Has that even been done? If so what come of that? I mean of course I know the first generation would be hets. I mean has there been any "hypo" X albino visuals/homozygous.

Yes it has been done, I saw on thamnophis.com a thread where someone produced "hypos" and albinos in the same clutch.

Has it been proven that any of the hetero albino's was indeed hypo as well? Did they appear any different than normal albino's?

he said he got one baby albino that was also hypo... he said he could tell easily.... I am not sure how easy it really would be to tell. I can't imagine that the albino form of that snake would look much at all different from a normal albino!

I do expect certain albino's to "cover" other genetics such as we've already discussed the Iowa to cover the cream colored Kansas strain. But the hypo gene combined with albino in other snakes is refered to as hybino. Definately an apparant difference. Although this is not your technical "hypomelanistic" so it could turn out different. I however suspect that since this hypo gene changes the colors of the green, yellow shades and not the black it would appear different. The albino just eliminating the melanin and leaving the yellow. I would guess it'd look like the albino checkered with a neon yellow color? Or maybe even a bleached yellow color. Of course I could be totally wrong but seems if this is a codom trait it won't take much effort and time to prove it out.