Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I've always admired cal kings and easterns with especially white rings/chains. Some seem a little murky and it seems that's a result of their having black skin beneath the white scales--on a well fed snake the black shows through at the edges.

I haven't done a careful study of this, and don't have anything at hand to examine for confirmation. Do some kings, in fact, have white skin behind the white scales (and black skin behind the black scales?)

>> "Do some kings, in fact, have white skin behind the white scales (and black skin behind the black scales?)"

Absolutely my good man!,...they can have varying shades of skin underneath.

A LONG time ago, I searched an entire afternoon at the Orlando Reptile Expo(before it was held at Daytona) for a 50/50 Cal. king that was snow white, a white belly, not beige or cream, and jet black rings, and had light skin underneath. I went through tons of them before I finally found a killer one that was just right. And even this one's skin was a tad dark, but nowhere near as pronounced as some of the other's I saw, I think it takes away some of the contrasting beauty if it is real dark.

~Doug

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"a snake in the grass is a GOOD thing"

>> A LONG time ago, I searched an entire afternoon at the Orlando Reptile Expo(before it was held at Daytona) for a 50/50 Cal. king that was snow white, a white belly, not beige or cream, and jet black rings, and had light skin underneath.

yes, that's what i'm talking about. thanks for doing the research for me, you've verified what i'd suspected. in light of the first response to your post, re: scaleless animals, I think the skin pattern must not always line up precisely with the scale patterns, and that when that happens, it reduces the boldness of the phenotype.

that's a beautiful animal in the picture you provided. does anyone have pictures of similarly distinct black-and-white eastern kings?

>> "I think the skin pattern must not always line up precisely with the scale patterns, and that when that happens"

That could be a possibility, but keep in mind, just because a particular line of scaleless corn or Texas Rats have patterned different colored skin, doesn't mean all other types do by any means. Black milksnakes have solid light skin, MBK's(nigrita) have solid dark skin, etc...that would be interesting to know which multi-colored/patterned types do, and which ones don't.

Hmmm, ...so let me go get a fish scaler, or potato peeler and scrape back the scales on some of my fine animals and find out for sure here,..... I'll get back with ya shortly..LOL!

~Doug
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"a snake in the grass is a GOOD thing"

>>
>> A LONG time ago, I searched an entire afternoon at the Orlando Reptile Expo(before it was held at Daytona) for a 50/50 Cal. king that was snow white, a white belly, not beige or cream, and jet black rings, and had light skin underneath. I went through tons of them before I finally found a killer one that was just right. And even this one's skin was a tad dark, but nowhere near as pronounced as some of the other's I saw, I think it takes away some of the contrasting beauty if it is real dark.
>>
>>
>> ~Doug
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>>"a snake in the grass is a GOOD thing"

Now thats a nice looking Cal King Doug. That's the one snake That got me started.
When I was growing up I remember seeing a adult black and white Cal King crossing our driveway, what a beautiful snake it was in the wild. About 30 yrs. later my son wanted a corn snake which I thought was cool, but back in my mind I still had that desire for that gloss black, and brite white Cal king. I talk myself into purchaseing one, to display along side my sons snake.
AND THAT WAS THE START OF MY SNAKE ADDICTION.
Thanks for sharing;
-Bob
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R.Bichlers Colubrids
http://www.webspawner.com/users/rbichler/index.html

HAHAHA!!, Boy, I can certainly understand that! The stark contrast they have is VERY tough to beat! They can really attract your attention visually.

thanks for the compliment too.

~Doug
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"a snake in the grass is a GOOD thing"

The scaleless rat snakes seem to indicate snake skin is indeed patterned.

>>The scaleless rat snakes seem to indicate snake skin is indeed patterned.

Does anyone have pix of any scaleless rat snakes? what rat subspecies has the mutation occurred on? has it appeared on any other species?

The reason I said "seems to indicate" as opposed to "shows us" is that while it does oocur in them, I have no way of knowing if that's the case with all snakes. What happens in the case of black racers or black milksnakes, who go from colored and patterned babies to a solid adult?

There was a pic of a scaleless rat snake in the classifieds recently, and I have seen them in person at the NY Metro Reptile Expo in the past.

Not sure anything I said helped anything.

Terry,....if you do a google "image" search, there are some that are pictured. I know of cornsnakes, and Texas Ratsnakes that the mutation is known from.

Also, here is a scaleless Death Adder I have a pic of on my computer..LOL!

~Doug

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"a snake in the grass is a GOOD thing"

here's a better pic of the Death Adder.

Also, I saw a scaleless Rattlesnake, and a couple other things too,....weird stuff..LOL!

You can even see the snake's "caudal lure" at the tip of the tail very clearly..LOL!

~Doug

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"a snake in the grass is a GOOD thing"

Wow Doug. That is one strange looking beast. Kinda looks like a sea slug or sea cucumber.

LOL!,..yeah, pretty weird for sure!

looks sort of like a striped..uh, well, you know..LOL!

~Doug
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"a snake in the grass is a GOOD thing"

No, the skin color is the same under black scales and white scales (I'm talking about Cal kings.)

I had a few coastal Cal kings where the skin was a lighter shade than many others. But those snakes were brown and yellow. Beautiful.

I bred an amel Cal king to a black and white Cal. The babies didn't look like much, but as adults they were stunning. Light brown, nice creamy yellow. The skin color under the scales was fairly light overall, making the webbing on the yellow less noticeable.
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Mark

>>No, the skin color is the same under black scales and white scales (I'm talking about Cal kings.)

Mark, I bow to your superior knowledge about almost all things serpentine. But i'm not sure you're right about this. See the pic, from a more recent post, and how the skin between the creamy scales is black or near-black? I could swear I've seen bold black-and-white cal kings where the skin behind the white scales is white too, making for particularly contrasty patterns. Am I just having false or implanted memories? And it seems like i've seen eastern kings with particularly "clean" chains which, upon examination, proved to be the result of light skin behind those white scales, so there was nothing to break up the solid white mass.

Can we review the issue any more?

I guess I should never say never. I just can't remember where the skin color was different under the different color scales. Lighter overall under all scales, yes, just not different color.

I know someone with a blk & wht Cal king that is boldly ringed and very clean. I'll bend the snake like your picture there and let you know.

I do know with young adult Cal kings, the skin between the scales may not show as much, giving the snake very distinct banding w/o that webbing. And certain coastal kings can have very light skin under the scales.

Also, notice that black & white striped kings have very clean stripes as adults. The skin doesn't show under those scales, them being on top.
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Mark

Might be an L.A. Co. King trait. I know alot of the ones from IC L.A. & L.B. look like they have dirty yellow bands. I'm not sure whether the ones out in Lancaster, which is L.A. Co. share the trait.

reako45