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Well I have aquired my first red-tailed boa. Is it possible to tell locality by color, speckling, anything?

>>Well I have aquired my first red-tailed boa. Is it possible to tell locality by color, speckling, anything?

Not with any level of accuracy.

To further muddy the issue, many localities and even SSP's have been intermingled so the ONLY true way to know if your boa is a specific locality is to have traceability of the lineage back to the specific locality.
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Thanks,

Dave Colling

www.rainbows-r-us-reptiles.com

0.1 Wife (WC and still very fiesty)
0.2 kids (CBB, a big part of our selective breeding program)

LOL, to many snakes to list, last count (02/01/2010):
42.61 BRB
27.40 BCI
And those are only the breeders

lots.lots.lots feeder mice and rats

Thanks for responding, I do have some pics of this little guy.

Here's another pic.

This should help:

CLICK HERE for my blog

jb
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What's written above is purely my opinion. In fact, MOST of what you read on the internet is someone's opinion. Don't take it too seriously

Jonathan Brady
DeviantConstrictors.com Site received a complete makeover! Check it out!

Thankyou so much. That really set me straight. I was as you pointed out, obviously misinformed that certain visual traits indicated geographical region of origin. Now my next question. Is the high pinks found in some boas a traight that can be proven through breeding. I have heard of some people refering to certain high pink boas being salmon. Not asking to be a punk or a buthead, just curious.

No sweat Unfortunately, many people are accidentally or intentionally misinformed when they enter this hobby. It's really unfortunate.

With regards to color, there are some color variations that appear to work in predictable manners (simple recessive, co dominant, etc.) as well as others that work in a polygenic manner. More often than not, the pink/red color is a polygenic trait meaning that there's nothing to prove out and it works kind of like skin color in people.

With regards to "salmon", that's actually a line name referring to hypomelanistic boas from Rich Ihle's stock. The other line of hypos is the "Orange Tail" line which is often denoted "OT".

Some people use the word "salmon" to describe the color of a non-hypo boa and while they may be correct, it can be awfully confusing. For someone new to boas, they may not know whether the person means a hypo boa from the salmon line or a boa with salmon color. I believe that many do this intentionally with newbies when attempting to make a sale. Some do not, but I believe them to be in the minority.

I hope that helps

jb
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What's written above is purely my opinion. In fact, MOST of what you read on the internet is someone's opinion. Don't take it too seriously

Jonathan Brady
DeviantConstrictors.com Site received a complete makeover! Check it out!

That help a lot. However, I did not purchase this boa. I got called by some friends and they said they had found a snake on their screened in patio and could I come over and remove it for them. When I got there I found this boa. Needless to say I took it home. I also have 5 ball pythons and 2 Dumerils boas.

From the looks of these pics, it doesnt appear to be a red tail(BCC) ..... It looks to be an imperator..... aside from that.. there is really no way of identifying the locality of this boa
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Marc Duhon
Lafayette, Louisiana
SURINAMBOAS.COM
kaiyudsai@SURINAMBOAS.COM