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I copied this picture posted here a while back but never heard what it was. Anybody have info on this?

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>>I copied this picture posted here a while back but never heard what it was. Anybody have info on this?

Looks Hypomelanistic to me Ross......Pretty too....
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John Lassiter
Poor planning and procrastination on your part does not constitute an emergency on my part...
www.coastalbendcaptivebreeding.com

Yeah, I think it looks hypo too but what kind? I have a desert phase hypo that looks nothing like it. It doesn't look like a lavender or a blue eyed blond either. Maybe its the lighting but it does look odd to me. The eyes look strange too.
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Those eyes do look weird. Very pretty snake.

That is my snake
I did not produce it.
Me and another knucklehead bought some of those at Daytona and they were sold to us as Axanthic.
Gourmet Rodent had them, and they said that the clutches of morphs and normals led them ot believe they were Axanthics but they very well may be Hypo?
That is a male and he has been a royal pain, regurging and growing slowly but he may breed in 2011 and I think I will breed him to a nice Albino I have.
It is really a cool animal, but I could not score a male so I am hoping I make some hets next season...
Tom Stevens
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TomsSnakes.com
twitter.com/TomsSnakes

Thanks a lot, Tom. Maybe it is a hypo but from those pictures, it looks different than mine. Yours appears to be a desert phase. I found a desert phase hypo as a yearling. I never seen it as a juvenile, so maybe it looked like yours and maybe not. Here is a picture of it as a yearling under the mid day sun.

And a picture of her as a young adult.

It will be interesting to see how yours turns out. I've never seen another hypo like mine. Are the eyes on yours abnormally dark like they appear to be in the picture?

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Wow man!, I really like that photo of the hypo and normal side by side there Ross!. They look almost like mirror images of each other except for their coloration of course.

Having it next to the normal jet-black individual really shows-off the hypomelanism in the one specimen!

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

my website -serpentinespecialties.webs.com

Thanks, Doug! I was very pleased with the way it turned out my self. I have this picture too but like the other one better.

Its the same one that came out on this poster for natural accuring Cal king morphs.

I think that hypo was my best fine. I produced hets this year for the first time.
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That was definitely one HELLUVA find!. And wow!, that other photo and collage poster deal is awesome!. Did you do that collage with all the different morph variations?

Very nice!

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

my website -serpentinespecialties.webs.com

No, actually Jeremiah Easter put that together. He used 3 of my snakes and a bunch of his and Brian Hubbs photos too. I think it goes for 20 bucks at Diamondback trading cards.com. It lists the name of the morph and what county they were found in right next to each snake. I'd love to see more like that done on other species as well.
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Oh yes!,...I would also like to see that done with other types as well.

That was really well-done!

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

my website -serpentinespecialties.webs.com

As Tom said, these were produced by us here at the Gourmet Rodent. We're still not sure what to make of them. Our first one was produced years ago randomly. I had assumed they were hypo desert phase, but our breeding efforts have proven that to be incorrect, at least when bred to the ususal hypos prevalent in herpetoculture (non-allelic). We have simply been calling them "axanthic or anerythristic" for lack of a better term. It is a recessive trait. It could be a different form of hypomelanism, non-allelic with the usual hypo Cals, but it also may very well be anerythristic or axanthic. We hear lots of opinions but it is one of those things probably nobody will agree on unless an in-depth, costly analysis of their chromatophores is undertaken. Interestingly, hets are always coastal phase but these hets never have the dark blue/black eyes. We have brought a number of desert phase snakes into the mix yet hets are still always coastal (yellow background coloration). Again, that does not automatically mean it is axanthic, though, as is the conclusion many would jump to.

When fresh hatched, the "anerys" are only slightly lighter than a normal desert banded, but they progressively get lighter as they mature. So far, males always lighten up more than females. If there is interest and I have some time I'll post some pictures illustrating my descriptions better.

We have a number of double het animals getting ready to breed soon, so it will be interesting to see how this trait combines with T and T- amels, hypos, etc. We have actually scaled back this project as there has been very little interest in them beyond a few kingsnake enthusiasts. Hope this helps.

Adam Black
The Gourmet Rodent, Inc.

I understand your hesitation to invest a lot of time [time is money] into any given project but I thought these were really cool and was bummed I did not get a female.
Cal Kings got a but of a bum deal with pricing, and I am one of the types of breeders who will gladly blow some cash on a new project but the Cal Kings seemed to be the hardest to decipher as far as what is what?
I see many people throwing in the towel on colubrids when we colubrid breeders should be showing off our projects with pride and grabbing the attention of other breeders whose markets may have taken a beating.
I for one would really like to see more pics. It is a shame we have so much, more morphs and snakes than ever before and somehow that has been a negative... hard to have a "wow" factor these days
Tom Stevens
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TomsSnakes.com
twitter.com/TomsSnakes

Thanks for your response, Adam. That is all very interesting. I for one would really like to see a picture of an adult male and any others you could throw in.
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