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My male Gilean has a smiley face on his head, and I was wondering if that could be a trait passed on to his offspring. It makes me smile every time I see it, and would be great to make more smiles. It seems that head spots are pretty random, but baldies and tangerine heads have been produced.

He just recently reached 20g, and I was able to confirm that he is actually a he. I think his coloration is absolutely striking. I think he’s a hypo tangerine…but not 100% sure. He just shed yesterday, and he’s starting to develop more orange on his body (which is currently caramel colored). What I love the most is that he has perfect delineation between a snow white belly, caramel top…with a thin stripe of dark brown between the two for extra contrast. I’ll post more pics in a little bit so everyone can see what I mean. I’ve never seen a gecko quite like him…so I’m not sure of his morph. If you have a guess, please let me know!

This was taken over natural maple...just to give you an idea of how deep his color is.

He had a lot of red-orange pop up after his last shed (near arrows). The first picture was taken only 6 grams ago. Now he's 20g...so he's got a lot of growing and changing to go still. I can't wait to see how he'll end up!

This is from his left side...isn't the contrast striking?

Here's his right side. Maybe i'm just an overproud mommy...but I think he's one of the best looking geckos I've seen. Not that I haven't seen other geckos that make me drool and my wallet cry...but I own him! I think I might breed him in the future and see if I can keep the contrast going with even less spots...and keep the smiley face (if I can).

To my knowledge, the spots on a leo's head/body are not genetic, other than to say whether they have them or not (a patternless won't...)

~~Dusty Windom
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So Many Alleles, So Little Time...!
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~~The Gecko Barn~~

That smiley face on his head is so cute. My albino has the cutest swirl pattern on his head so I know what you mean about the smiley face but I've never seen another one with the same pattern. I will have to say that he's adorable though. I'm still looking for another gecko that jumps out at me and says take me home like my other two did. They didn't do it literally but people that truely love these animals know what I mean. I really can't tell you what he is because I've never seen a gecko that looks like that and I've been looking for months now because I didn't know what my female was but I've narrowed it down. When you find out what he is I'd like to know if you don't mind since he's so adorable and I can't make up mind as to what my next one will be. If I had my way I'd have one of every kind.

I would say, if he's still only a juvenile (which I believe you said, and that's what he looks like from the photos), that he'll most likely be a hypo tangerine. Otherwise, he's a tangerine. A leo has to have 10 spots or fewer to be considered a hypo tangerine, if I remember correctly.

~~Dusty Windom
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So Many Alleles, So Little Time...!
@
~~The Gecko Barn~~

very cute leo!
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