Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Question:
If one breeds a striped Pacific gopher to a blotched Pacific gopher what are the odds of getting striped offspring? Female is striped and het for albino, etc, and blotched male is not het for anything. They are not related, either.
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Bob
Pyromaniac AKA Greatballzofire
Keeping cats allows man to cohabitate with tigers. Keeping reptiles allows man to cohabitate with dinosaurs.

Bob,

While I can't answer your question, I have always been very interested in the striped Pacific morph. Not just any striped morph but one with ribbon quality lines from head to tail without any mottling or broken lines. One of the sites that I have visited within the naturally occurring range of that morph, routinely produces such. Blotched individuals are very prevalent there too but I have no idea what the percentages are. Here are a few of the striped morphs that I'm talking about. Very clean lines...

There are plenty of splotchy examples produced every year by breeders but I have yet to see any that matched what I've seen in certain wild populations. When anyone can routinely produce these and there's nothing else mixed in, I'll purchase one. In the meantime, the wild examples look the absolute best...
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“You could have a snake for 30 years and the second you leave his cage door cracked, he’s gone, and they’ll never come to you unless you’re holding a mouse in your teeth.” (Bill Haast, 1997).

That is perfect! I may go herping this spring in some of the counties I know that have these striped morphs.
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Bob
Pyromaniac AKA Greatballzofire
Keeping cats allows man to cohabitate with tigers. Keeping reptiles allows man to cohabitate with dinosaurs.

One could conduct some very interesting breeding experiments of the type that would answer your question if one had access to some good wild stock. Get out in some of that country during neonate season and see if you can find a range of patterns from perfect to something less than the nominate form. Keep good notes on the percentages of blotched vs. striped. Wish I were as close. Would love to take on a project like that myself. The gophers with ribbon snake, sharp lines from head to tail...
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“You could have a snake for 30 years and the second you leave his cage door cracked, he’s gone, and they’ll never come to you unless you’re holding a mouse in your teeth.” (Bill Haast, 1997).

The normal pattern of the Pacific gopher snake is a longitudinal series of dorsal blotches, but in some areas of California an occasional specimen is found to have a pattern of longitudinal stripes rather than the ubiquitous blotched pattern. The striped variants differ additionally by having an unmarked venter with none of the small black squares that are found on many of the ventral plates of the blotched specimens. Controlled captive breedings involving blotched and striped specimens demonstrate that the widespread blotched pattern is recessive to the striped variant.
Genetics of Striping in the Gopher Snake, Pituophis melanoleucus
Elizabeth R. Bechtel and Terrence Whitecar
Journal of Herpetology
Vol. 17, No. 4 (Dec., 1983), pp. 362-370

So I may try my lone adult striped female to my adult blotched male and see what develops.

My blotched pair

My female striper (baby pic, need to update photos)

I really want a male striper and don't want to have to buy one since I already have the gene.
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Bob
Pyromaniac AKA Greatballzofire
Keeping cats allows man to cohabitate with tigers. Keeping reptiles allows man to cohabitate with dinosaurs.

Bob,

Is your female pure catenifer? I have heard that at least some of these are the result of hybridization with annectens. That introduces some uncertainty in regards to linage among the various lines out there in breeder land.

I suspect that clutches from purely catenifer stock produced a percentage of the nominant (blotched) form for which there seems to be little or no market (as they are mostly brown). Due to the interest in yellow, orange or red snakes, there have been a number of striped neonates available in those color schemes but they are nearly all incompletely striped if not heavily mottled. Perhaps that's as good as it got from those that tried to routinely produce the striped morph.

Ginter is on the verge (a year or two away) of breeding some captive wild stock so I am intently interested in that outcome. I may pursue such an experiment myself in a few years. Good luck with yours. Are you going to pair your adults this season?

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“You could have a snake for 30 years and the second you leave his cage door cracked, he’s gone, and they’ll never come to you unless you’re holding a mouse in your teeth.” (Bill Haast, 1997).

In the interest of trying to prevent any more baby snakes this year, I will wait until next year to pair them up. I need to brumate them together first, anyway. In the meantime I may get lucky and find a truly outstanding striper or two, like in your photos. Also there is no point in producing a hard to sell snake. I have all these pyro and bull babies which everyone thinks are awesome and yet have not managed to sell a single one.

I don't know if she is pure catenifer; got her from Jason Nelson, who knows his species, so she likely is. I lost the male that came with her (her brother), and my friend lost the other male I had as unrelated stock. I have just had bad luck with male striped p.catenifer catenifer.
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Bob
Pyromaniac AKA Greatballzofire
Keeping cats allows man to cohabitate with tigers. Keeping reptiles allows man to cohabitate with dinosaurs.

I just absolutely love Pacific gophers and they are currently the only type that I do not have. Oh the opportunities too and the gorgeous neonates that I've caught in places where they were not likely to live very long (near or on busy roads).

Here's a not-so-clean striper that we found last year. Note the clear ventrals...

Found this typical in nearly the same place a short while later.

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“You could have a snake for 30 years and the second you leave his cage door cracked, he’s gone, and they’ll never come to you unless you’re holding a mouse in your teeth.” (Bill Haast, 1997).

Nice finds!
What I find in my area. This one was found while weed whacking, fortunately uninjured.

Another older one found nearby.
No stripers in my area, have to go west to adjoining counties.
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Bob
Pyromaniac AKA Greatballzofire
Keeping cats allows man to cohabitate with tigers. Keeping reptiles allows man to cohabitate with dinosaurs.

So the striped mutant gene is dominant to its normal counterpart. Interesting! Thanks much for the information!

It is possible that many of the better stripes have two copies of the striped mutant gene. And many of the poorer stripes have a striped mutant paired with a normal gene. Or it could be selection in the wild. I have heard claims that blotches are better at camouflaging a stationary snake while stripes are better for moving snakes. This is all speculation, though.

This picture is labeled nelson-co-dominant-cvs. I collected it awhile back and cant remember from what, now.
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Bob
Pyromaniac AKA Greatballzofire
Keeping cats allows man to cohabitate with tigers. Keeping reptiles allows man to cohabitate with dinosaurs.