Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hi all,

These are the adults that produced the GA easterns that hatched this week and the two clutches that are still cooking. The first pic is dad, or "Frank the Tank", as he is affectionately known around here. Thanks for looking.

Will

This is the mother of the clutch that just hatched. I apologize for the poor quality of these pictures, it was very sunny and the snakes are very washed out, the damn things also wouldn't sit still (LOL).
Thanks for looking.

Will

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She is very skinny because she took it upon herself to double clutch this year. She was not introduced to any males, but she dropped another 9 good eggs anyway......right on the heat pad. By the time I found them the next day, they were all hard boiled......sh#*!

Will

She also looks very skinny in this photo. This tiny little thing (40 inches..maybe) dropped the largest clutch of the season, 15 fertile eggs. I've never had an eastern clutch that size. She is finally starting to pack it back on, but when she finished laying she was skin and bones. She is a trooper.

Will

I would not mind adding a 1.1 pr to my collection.
do ya have a website?

'Frank the tank', aka 'Tail-eater' lol!

Glad he bred for you, hadn't you said before you were a bit worried that he'd devour his mates due to his enormous feeding response?
That is one smart looking snake...they ALL are, but he really is something else, I love him!

AND I love mine! I just wish they'd calm down a bit so I can handle 'em more...they're big enough to do some damage now (on me at least) when they nip, and if it were just one or 2 bites a session it'd be one thing...but these 2 are psycho snappers! Psycho-eaters too, so I guess I shouldn't complain much. I'll try get some pics up soon, problem is, like yours, they will NOT sit still, even in their boxes..crazy kids! They still have a good deal of their orange left though, Juju's orange is so dark it looks almost red in the middle of her crossbars. I hope it stays that way. I'm thinking at the least it will stay a nice pumpkin-orange in those spots as an adult
~Roo
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"Klaatu...Verata...Nicht--cough, cough, cough!"

Thanks Roo

If necessary, put on the gloves and work with them daily if need be. My holdbacks have calmed down to the point of tail wagging at me, but I don't handle them much at all. They typically grow to be very docile, that is as long as you don't smell like something edible. I got chewed on this morning when I was bringing one of the GA girls out for pics. I forgot that the last thing I held was a large jungle carpet python, that is, I forgot until that little girl started chewing and wrapping up my forearm where the jungle was just coiled. I guess it doesn't matter if it is a much larger python from another other corner of the globe, if it's a snake, these GA kings smell only one thing....FOOD! Hang in there Roo...show 'em who's boss! Thank you for the kind words also. Take care.

Will

I love that adult male. Very wide bands. Outstanding

Steve

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that a georgeous snake , i dont want to start anything here , but, do you honestly beleive thats an eastern l.g.g and NOT a intergrade of l.g.g and l.g.fla.?, it just looks to me that it has some floridana it, somewhere down its line anyway, maybe im way off but thats my opinion,,,,thomas

Hi Thomas,

We can easily trace this lineage back to the wild founder stock both collected by Kevin Enge. The founder male was from Statenville GA and the female from Tifton GA. I am not sure, but I don't believe either of those locales are within the range of goini, and definately not within the range of (pure) floridana. Neither of the founders showed any trace of goini or other influence in their pattern. Both of these animals as well as my original pair (F1s) from the wild stock can be seen on Keith's website. The F1 pair that I originally purchased from Kevin also show no physical evidence of any historical gene flow with another eastern type getula. The F1 breeding revealed some interesting characteristics of this lineage, that being, when they are line bred, a small but consitant minority of the offspring have very wide band width. Now Frank is the most extreme, but many of his sibs have shown these same characteristics to a lesser degree. A good example is Keith's monsterous '03 male. I hatched what could be that animal's twin this week, deep red with very wide bands. I also hatched a king that could be Frank's twin, but it suffered from severe vertebral kinking during an incubation temperature spike and must be euthanized with another snake from the clutch.

Also, these snakes do not get any speckling with age as all of the florida complex kings do (goini, penninsula intergrade, or brooksi). Some individuals hatch with a little isolated speckling, as do animals from all eastern locales, but they absolutely do not develop speckling with age.

I know it it is easy to say that since this animal looks so different it must be some sort of an intergrade, but all evidence just points to this being an exremely variable lineage of eastern kingsnakes. Could it be a possiblility that these unusual traits are being drawn out because of some historical genetic flow with another eastern type getula? Sure it could, but I think the same could be said for any of the southern type easterns. I have seen wildcaught specimens from Jasper Co. S. Carolina that showed similar pattern anomolies and they are surely well outside of the range of any hanky panky with a florida type king. Actually, somebody please correct me if I am wrong, but I believe coastal SC is also where the founders of the mosaic eastern line descended. They have a pattern type very similar to Frank's and they are also from an area far outside of any recent Fla. influence. Who knows what gene flow occurred before we got these snakes into captivity, but I can honestly state that every snake bred in captivity up to the generation that produced Frank was a textbook pure appearing eastern. I am not a fan of intergrades or hybrids and would absolutely not produce more if I thought they were mutts. Take care.

Will

While not many of these anomalies make it adulthood,it is more likely that the ones that do are more readily incorperated into breeding plans.
The different "races" of kings that occur between NC and FL(OBX,mosaics,goini,and intergrades) would lead me to believe that the variability has to do with predation avoidance because there are no natural barriers at work here.I think if ANY line of kings was continually line bred that more of the other"ssp"lookalikes would occur.I remember a OUTER BANKS pic posted a couple years ago that I know was pure but damn if it didnt look ALOT like a brooksi.If you didnt KNOW the locale of those NICE(very nice!)GA animals I bet you would have some people guessing California's,lol. I have been breeding mostly milks for about 15 years because of the variability--which is more easily emphasized with 3 colors instead of 2--but with this line/morph breeding and the addition of ORANGE to the bicolored animals I think them as attractive as any milk.And I wont even mention getting the babies started.But WHO is breeding the mosaics?? Still havent found any,Jeff

thanks for the info its just my opinion that they have some floridana in the line, somewhere maybe generations before your original w/c animals, but the red/orange is why i say that, the red/orange did not just develop in l.g.g it was bred into l.g.g anyway thats my opinion. and whats up w/the term MUTT? i never said or thought your snake was a mutt,but do you actually think that a fla.king and l.g.g cross is a mutt? its a perfectly natural intergrade?that happens extensively where their nat. ranges overlap or once overlapped, are natural intergrades MUTTS? or do you consider UNnatural intergrades(where ranges DONT overlap) mutts?
thomas davis

Hi Thomas,

I did not mean to imply that you called my animals mutts, and no I do not consider a natural intergrade between animals who's ranges overlap to be mutts. I do however consider the offspring of animals that would never meet and breed in the wild to be mutts. To me, a jungle corn is a mutt, a jurassic milk is a mutt, a sinaloan cal king cross is a mutt, although I should probably use another term as calling them mutts is an insult to mutt canines, of which I am very fond. Just my opinion.

However, I disagree that the red was bred into g. getula. I have seen it in varying degrees in babies of all populations that I have seen. In fact, my '03 NJs from Keith still have some red in them.. I just think that some populations of GA animals have a bit more and it can be easily coaxed out of them through line breeding. Good discussion. Take care.

Will

Here is a little montage I put together of this line.

1. Echols Co., GA male (WC)
2. Tift Co., GA female (WC)
3. F1 offspring to 1 and 2
4. F2 offspring to parents 3
5. F2 offspring to parents 3
6. F1 offspring from male 1 and one of his daughters.

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Thanks Keith,

BTW, that number six is a smoker, have you gotten any updates regarding this snake?

Will

Ill have to ask Kevin how that snake looks next time I talk to him. Maybe he can send me an updated pic etc... Are you gonna take pics of those baby NJ Easterns you hatched out ?

Keith
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