Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I'm posting this for a friend who recently produced the hatchlings shown in the images below. The pairing was Lesser x "normal".

There are three Lessers in the clutch, two "normals" (although one of the "normals" has a small amount of white in an area where it normally would not be (shown in the last two images) and the hatchling shown in the first two images.

If you have any ideas about what you think may have caused the odd phenotype on this hatchling, he would like to hear them.

Thanks for looking.

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Louis Kirkland
Cornerstone Reptiles

Those are Paradox. The one with the great amount of white looks like a Parti-Mojave but with the Lesser gene instead of the Mojave gene.
You can find pictures of the Parti-Mojave on the net, just google it.
Paradox isn't genetic altough it is reknowned that some animals produce a lot of Paradox offspring.

Great looking animals by the way!
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www.rockingroyals.com

For a bit of help in understanding what is going on, you would want to read up on Chimeras (not the mythical type, the genetic type) and Genetic Mosaics.

" In medical science, a chimera is an individual having more than one genetically-distinct population of cells that originated from more than one zygote." - Taken from below link

"Mosaics and chimeras are animals that have more than one genetically-distinct population of cells. The distinction between these two forms is quite clearly defined, although at times ignored or misused. In mosaics, the genetically different cell types all arise from a single zygote, whereas chimeras originate from more than one zygote" - Taken from below link

As the other poster stated, they are more than likely "Paradox" animals which is the term used in the ball python community to describe these phenomenon.

http://www.vivo.colostate.edu/hbooks/genetics/medgen/chromo/mosaics.html

The high white one is absolutley awesome.
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JEMreptiles@gmail.com from sunny AZ.

Lots of cool Ball Pythons along with
0.0.1 Vietnamese Blue Beauty and some great Bull snakes.
1.1 Argentinian Black and White Tegus
1.0 Gotti Pitbull (Tank)
2.0 Beautiful Bengals (Stryker and Cynbad)
12 Tarantulas
Last but most Important 2.2 Children

My first thought was paradox as well. But then it dawned on me that the only paradox animals I've seen with that much white are some type of leucistic such as ivories or super lessers for example. This breeding was apparently a lesser x normal which would explain the normal coloring on the snake but not the heavy amounts of white.

I'm struggling right now to remember the terms associated with the scenarios involving a homozygous animal appearing when it shouldn't, but it essentially involves damage at that locus wherein it repairs it using the alternate allele. Another option would be if it had previously been bred to another lesser, or parthogenesis would be valid as well.

If they were my snakes, I would definitely pair them up again next year to investigate further, whether I believed them to be genetic or not, paradox or something new. Its good to get some closure and more understanding either way, and worst case you get some nice lessers.

the paradox is SWEEEEET,,,,,,

it may or may not be genetic...you gotta prove it ...

I had a lesser that threw paradox...3 of them...2 different years......mine were extra black markings on them...and sweet too...

yours is really nice....breed it well....and often....

the one with the little bit of white...it will probably shed off....you'll see.....
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........JY

Thank you to everyone who posted. I appreciate your comments and opinions.
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Louis Kirkland
Cornerstone Reptiles