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I keep a little of everything but I spend most of my time with bloods. I saw this girl on KS a few weeks back and just had to get my hands on her. She was advertised as IJ. I wasnt disappointed. She is presently being camera defiant so this pix will have to do until I get her settled down a little. In person she is incredibly beautiful with faint hues and an almost airbrushed look. Cool dorsal pattern. Oddly she seems to have a very faint hint of irridescent blue on her laterals. I dont have any immediate plans to breed her but I sure would like to know just what she is. A melanistic IJ with reduced pattern? A small percentage chondro (dorsal pattern and faint blue)? A cross with a striped coastal? A manifestation of my drug crazed 70s'?

I saw her advertised as well. We used to have a very dark male (Pictured above) named Vader that would have been the perfect mate for her.
We ditched on the "dark" project as we could not find a female dark enough for him. The one you got would have been the ticket! I would love to see what she could produce if you found a super dark male for her. Good luck!

-Yasser

SR

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Yasser

That was a bit of serendipity. I just came from your web site and saw you replied to my post. I've been eyeballing your babies. I have money set aside for snakes but I need to find my big fat banka blood female a male before I start any other projects. Ive got a taste for these morelia now and I think they are next on the big project list. Ive got you book marked

Thanks for the help

Steve

>>I saw her advertised as well. We used to have a very dark male (Pictured above) named Vader that would have been the perfect mate for her.
>>We ditched on the "dark" project as we could not find a female dark enough for him. The one you got would have been the ticket! I would love to see what she could produce if you found a super dark male for her. Good luck!
>>
>>-Yasser
>>
>>SR
>>
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That's too bad! I like the dark. Very nice. Well, I like all of them...
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Lower Ground Reptiles

www.lowergroundreptiles.net

So that's where she went! I had contacted the seller about buying her as well, but I never got a response. Now I know why. Oh well, I'm a little jealous. Congrats on picking up a nice looking "dark" Papuan. I sure hope you find a mate for her and make some little ones. I would love to see what she would throw.

Yup, I jumped on her pretty quickly. The owner didnt really know anything about her but I took a chance. She is quite nice but now Yasser has me scared that I wont find an acceptable mate. Maybe I'll breed her to a normal IJ this year and breed back some of the hopefully het babies. Might be the only hope for the trait.

Happy snakin'
Steve

Suitable mates can be had...it's just that you've got to be ready for them just you you were with buying that female.
But please be aware that this is not a morph yet and more than likely will not be one at all. This most likely will not be a trait that is truly genetic by "herper standards". You won't get Het for dark babies. Your best bet is to track down the darkest male you can. Breeding two similar animals will hopefully yield some babies with dark characteristics...but not neccesarily. This is what I tend to call genetic propensity Vs true truly heritable traits (recessive or co-dominant). I find it hard at times to convey what I mean on this topic and at 3 Am with insomnia, Idon't think I am doing very well so I hope you understand what I am trying to get at here.

-Yasser

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Yasser

My wife and I are both molecular biologists by training. I used to work in human gene therapy and my wife still runs a genetics lab at a local university. I listen to herpers (including myself at times) talk about genetics with a bit of tongue-in-cheek (I am not referring to your comments). Visible traits have two origins either genetic or environmental/developmental. Things like color generally have multiple genes associated. Some characteristics are determined by things like fetal development during incubation, mothers biochemistry, temps and health etc etc . Other visible characteristics arise because of events that occur as a snake lives. Sunlight, disease, diet etc etc all influence how an animals looks. Remember that a gene codes only for a single protein but many proteins can be affected by developmental factors. So, how does this fit into the idea of a "morph". Technically morphology refers to any visible trait while geneotype refers to genetic make-up. If color is due to a gene(s) either dominant, co-dominant, partial dominance or recessive etc then offspring can/will inherit those genes or gene (if eggs and sperm that fuse are carrying that allele). Thus they would be (under my proposal) het for a gene that codes for a color variation. If this snakes unusual dark color is caused by environmental factors then of course the offspring will not carry the gene (s) but may carry the same genetic make-up that allowed their mother to turn dark under givin conditions. Should any of the physical characteristics be called a morph? I dont know, do we call blonde haired people a morph? I dont, but I also dont refer to an albino ball python as a morph unless I am talking to other herpers.

One of the recurrent themes in public understanding of genes is the idea that genes go away or skip generaton etc etc. I think herpers are unconsciously guilty of this to some extent. In humans we always find it strange when an child is born with red hair but neither the parents or grandparents have red hair. The gene or genes did not just randomly appear. They have been hanging around for a few generatons recessively waiting for the right combination to occur. Then after 4 generations up pops a red haired child. I suspect this happens a bit in herps as well. Ask Bob Applegate about Thayeri Kingsnakes. Their color and pattern are always like a grab bag. Some, none or all of the babies can look like the parents. Two white milk phase thayeri might throw all leonis phase offspring. Some might even be all black. After three or four generation Thayeri begin to breed "true". This of course means that their color and pattern are genetic but quite complicated. If we only use the data from a single cross we might be tempted to say it is not genetic. Even two generations of inbreeding may still not reveal a single offspring that resembles a parent. I have Thayeris and I also have bloods, morelia etc. I hear people say "that striped blood isnt genetic". Bloods havent been around long enough to convince me of anything. Ball pythons seem to be quite predictable and probably represent years of captive breeding along with a fairly well defined gene pool in the wild. I really dont know much about morelia but I suspect their gene pool is very poorly defined with many intergrades and quite a lot of migration in relatively recent times. It sure is fun to look at though isnt it.

I am not sure why I wrote all of that I guess Im a little punchy from not getting enough sleep myself. I certainly appreciate your comments and input. I hope I get an opportunity to meet you and buy you a drink as payment for listening to my rant.

Take care
Steve

She's just a darker IJ with a lot of dark pattern. I've got two adult females just like her. Here's a pic of one of them.

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Anthony Caponetto
www.ACreptiles.com