Reptile & Amphibian Forums

A friend has acquired this unknown Pit and needs an ID. I wanted this boards' imput.I will keep my own thoughts quiet for now...

What say the group??

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Lloyd Heilbrunn

Palm Beach Gardens, Fl.

Title should read Need,of course.
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Lloyd Heilbrunn

Palm Beach Gardens, Fl.

Awesome looking snake but could really use some better pics. Face looks bull to me but the pattern looks pine. The yellow body? Sure are some wierd looking pits around these days...sure hope things aren't getting too muddied-up.
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See all my snakes at SerpenTrack.com

I agree with the bull/pine hybrid theory. The midbody of this animal is light just like you see in many bullsnakes. But the blotches sure say pinesnake don't they? I'm no expert so I hate to say anything at all. But I do have a huge dose of caution when it comes to purity of line.

somebody playing around with ruthveni?????........and mixing stuff up?????

Not sure why you posted that one but it just looks like a northern to me Bob? As for ruthveni - I'm starting to think there's a lot of mud in the waters, not that I doubt there are some clean lines but there sure is some wierd stuff showing up lately.
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See all my snakes at SerpenTrack.com

i see northern....but it doesn't look pure......i have ruthveni from terry van and tom acosta.....so i have a good idea what one should look like.....this snake (to me) just shows some ruthveni traits....but like you stated...."muddy"...

Why do people buy something, when they dont know even what it is?

Jason

sometimes....its the mystery....

Maybe because it's a nice snake that needed a home?
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- Matt

1.0 Black Milk '04
1.0 Andean Milk '06
0.1 Eastern King '97
0.1 Bullsnake '09

Here

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Lloyd Heilbrunn

Palm Beach Gardens, Fl.

Another

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Lloyd Heilbrunn

Palm Beach Gardens, Fl.

nice pics. that snake has some and something else in it too. Pattern looks like a lot of pine. It's head kind of reminds me of my kankakee female.

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- Matt

1.0 Black Milk '04
1.0 Andean Milk '06
0.1 Eastern King '97
0.1 Bullsnake '09

The last pic looks like an IL bull but without good info its just a bull of some kind.
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“Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind.” Emmerson

WWW.TDSNAKES.BLOGSPOT.COM

To be safe I'd say its a Bull X Pine cross, and these make wonderfull pets, as long as they are not bred to anything else and sold as something else. If your friend bought it, I hope he didnt pay much at all, if he got it for free and he has room to keep it, why not- it is a pretty snake.

For clarification, I attached some pics of a few LA pines of mine to help with those who might think the snake has LA Pine in it.

who did you get your ruthveni from?????......i've 2.3 from terry van(the godfather of ruthveni)....and tom acosta......mine seem to differ in appearance from the ones you posted.(don't really mean nuttin, this species can vary depending on its locale).....the unknown ,to me, seems to have some ruthveni influence.....there are rumors out there that some breeders tried to "strengthen the genetics of ruthveni by out crossig them.....also i "heard" thhat some time ago some guy was crossing black pines with bull snakes and passing the results off as ruthveni....again rumors....can anyone verify these stories??

The larger pic is 3' and is Vendventer stock, and the next pic is also Vendventer stock but was less than 1yo in that pic. I know there has been mixing with LA pines and Bulls and with Pines by unscrupulous folks to try and get more "LA" pines to sell, since LA's only lay about 6 eggs at most. I have been very vigorouse in making sure where the animals I am interested originated, especially with animals in the price range of LAs.

I attached a pic of the female, from Suffolk Selects, again she was less than a year old in this pic.

Two or three years ago "Strictly Reptiles" was selling bull/pine crosses. They were advertising them as such. That sure looks like one of the ones they were selling. Again, I know most of you are purest, but sometimes these "hybrids" are very interesting animals. As long as the animals are represented as such, I see know problems with it. Terry told me himself that he had seen the blackpine/bullsnake crosses that were very similar to LA pines. I for one would love to see pictures of wild caught LA pines from across their range.

Dan

there were a couple on a different forum....they were from texas.....showed a lot of bull snake influence...

With regards to the original question, if that snake is really a hybrid to begin with I would have to purely guess that it's a Kankakee-type bull x Northern Pine. I think the Kankakee-types (including the Indiana localities of course) really are trying to adopt the "look" of eastern pine snakes. The head/nape region of that snake is screaming northern pine to me, but what the heck do I know.

As for ruthveni, don't get me started. Orchidspider, the second photo in your first post looks like a cross to me. Ruthveni, even CB ones from several generations, should appear "muddied" in the first quarter to third of their body. The saddles thereafter should be clear and crisp giving the appearance of taking two different snakes and joining them together. Of course, there should be a few inches of fading from one pattern to another.

Here is 2008 male from Tom Agosta:

Here is a 2008 female from Tom Agosta:

Here is a 2006 male from Terry Vandeventer:

Just my 2 cents, take it or leave it.
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--Brian Scott

Here is a photo of 2008 female (on right) and 2009 female (on left) P. ruthveni. The one on the left was suspect, while the one on the right is "less" suspect. While ruthveni, like all eastern pine snakes, are variable, some traits cannot be ignored.

The snake on the left ended up becoming considerably "less" suspect after hours and hours and hours of research, and is now in a good home and looks better than the one on the right. Go figure.
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--Brian Scott

soon you're going to up to your hackles in ruthveni.....i'll hit chew up tomorrow ......everyone ate and looks good....

I DO HAVE papers (from Suffolk Selects- he was VERY happy and EAGER to provide them for me via mail after I got them from him at the show) from the breeder of reciepts from Vanderventer about the purchase of the PARENTS of the snake in the SECOND pic... so relax buddy.

these are pics of the female that is more muddied....

Here are pics of my female from the same clutch as the male from VENDEVENTER stock via Suffolk selcts. not EVERY snake looks like how you expect it to all the time, but again I have a good strong paper trail.

i think brian meant no attack......this species can show variation accross their range.....ya got bulls on the west side and black pines on the east and both gene flow accross the middle .....so when we manipulate breeding so we mix the most diverse genetics we can get almost any type of phenotypes in the results......the captive pairing may mix up genotypes that may have never locked tails in the gulf coast widerness......does this make sense.....i'm 61 and gotta lots of stuff in my head....although most of the voices have been quiet...

Your right, sorry Brian if you read this, I needed to relax... its all good, we just love these animals as pure snakes, and I am sure there is some gene variation, just like some NPS here in NC can look very much like LAs when they naturally intergrade with Southerns down in SC and sometimes the genes travel up into NC...

Thanks Bob, you're right in that I did not mean any attack. Now if I could go back and EDIT my posts on this forum, the original post of mine would of had this sentence included in it.

"As for ruthveni, don't get me started. Orchidspider, the second photo in your first post looks like a cross to me, BUT IT DOESN'T MEAN THAT IT IS. Ruthveni, even CB ones from several generations, should appear "muddied" in the first quarter to third of their body. The saddles thereafter should be clear and crisp giving the appearance of taking two different snakes and joining them together. Of course, there should be a few inches of fading from one pattern to another."

Everything after the words in CAPS in simply a reflection of what some people have told me, and is the rule of thumb that I choose to use. If you read my second post, the one where I show that not everything is so crystal clear, then it's easy to sit there scratch your head and wonder what the heck was I thinking in making those posts!! That was a pretty damn important sentence!! LOLOLO

Anyway, I did not catch my typo until this morning, and since I cannot edit what I type on this forum I was just hoping you wouldn't catch it

Sorry about that....not trying to make you question your snakes any more than I already have, and I am sure the "haters" will chime in if their insecurities get the better of them and try to make you really question anything that is labeled as a "ruthveni."

That all said.....a solid paper trail is all we have to help us "feel better" about what we hope are the "real deal."

It's all cool on this end, and quite frankly I would like to see some more damn pix now!!! LOL

Cheers!!
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--Brian Scott

I have to agree with some of the others in that it has a real Kankakee Illinois locality sayi thing going but there are some pine snake looking characteristics in the mix as well..... Thats tough because with the high degree of individual variability in this genus you could probably go out and find NP or Bulls that look like that snake but that does not mean that this animal isn't a mix! Good, solid, reliable locality data on this snake or its parents would solve the problem and that is the one thing you don't have and probably can't get. So it remains a "mystery".....

Honestly I could be (and probably am) full of crap but ruthveni is the last pine species I would think of when considering what that animal looks like. Then again go to the dog shelter and try to sort out what parented some of the mixes you see....

too bad that snake doesn't have locality info... Thats a bull or pine line that I would be interested in........ very nice looking snake!

I agree with you John...it is not even close to passing the LA pine tests...but regardless a good looking animal. I know many get upset on this forum when the LA pine subject comes up...but I'm not really sure how diverse the breeding stock is. Outside of Terry, Riecher, KJ and the Memphis zoo, does anyone have stock that DOES NOT originate from them? And how diverse is that stock that they have? Outside of Beinville Parish, are there any other LA Pines in captivity? I have seen two wild caught LA pines, one from Texas and one from LA and about five pictures of wild caught ones. Everyone one them looked more like pines then bull snakes, and yet all of the captive animals, I have seen, including the ones I have, do not look like the pictures or wild caught ones I have seen. I know there are people who have spent their entire lives studing LA pines and they have only seen a handful.

John, that is a good looking Northern Pine. A lot of nice black color on the head. Is that a Jersey decendent? Hopefully some one will be producing that line and you can replace her.

Dan

Actually the image is not of my 18yr old breeder, (couldn't find a handy image so I posted a pic of a wild Burlington Co. NJ pine we saw last spring). Thanks to Bob Zapp, Bobby Fingers, Bernd, and of course pinesnake piney we were able to see and photograph several individuals in the wild!!!!!

That dark female was my first wild NP! grungy, dirty, scarred up and TOTALLY beautiful!

The barrens were uncharacteristically kind to us in sharing her pines and corns for our viewing pleasure. Thanks in no small part to an all star cast of big time barrens herpers!

Am I jonesing to get back out there or what!