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I picked up this big girl from Josh at FYB exotics. Ive never seen a honduran this dark, she's almost jet black. Tell me what yall think. Thanks, Matt

Hi Matt

Looking at your pic. I think what you have there is a Black Milksnake (Lampropeltis triangulum gaigeae) and not a Honduran Milksnake (Lapropeltis triangulum hondurensis). Some black milksnakes does not entirely change into all black. Some animals, like yours, retain the tricolor pattern in the vetral areas. I own both subspecies and one thing I noticed other than the amount of black(oviously) between the two is that gaigeae have stubby tails compared to hondurans. They are also usually larger. I'm pretty sure others in the forum will agree. Was this sold to you as a honduran? If it was, its a very bad business practice. Sorry if this might be upsetting but you might have been mislead by the seller. But I hope it helped. Take care.
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Jonel @ Selective Propagations
www.spsnakes.com

No, this is 100% honduran. The male I got with her is a tangerine. This one is just alot darker. Matt

I dunno, it is a wild caught animal it could possibly be a honduran black milk integrade? Matt

Honduran Milks and Black Milks don't intergrade in the wild since their ranges are separated by hundreds of miles.

It could just be a very dark Honduran, it is hard to tell from your photo.
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Chris Harrison

I think the first thing you'd want to do would be to check all the pertinent scale counts, triad counts, etc., to confirm it is a honduran. That can be hard to establish sometimes.

If it is, a melanistic strain might be interesting in the effects it could have when crossed with the others--a melanistic "amel" or albino, for ex, might be snow white. Or a mealnistic amel or snow might be solid yellow, if it were one of those that undergoes the ontogenic change of that kind.

keep us posted
terry

>>I picked up this big girl from Josh at FYB exotics. Ive never seen a honduran this dark, she's almost jet black. Tell me what yall think. Thanks, Matt
>>

Terry, the infralabial scale count is 9 and supralabial is 8. The supralabial scale count of a black milk is 7 from all the info I can find. I dont know if thats enough evidence to say its honduran for sure though. Also the triad pattern is visiable on the extreme ventral portion of the animal and it looks tangerine. If anyone knows anymore distinguishing features of Lampropeltis t. hondurensis please let me know. Matt

A melanistic snake is almost entirely black, except for an occasional white patch around the face(such as in garters). I have never seen a melanistic specimen of any species that had red like yours does, so clearly it is not melanistic, just unusually dark. A couple years of selective breeding and you could probably produce 95% black specimens.

Mike
Michael's Place

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Michael's Place has updated, better caresheets
KingPin Reptiles Inc.
Helmz777@aol.com
www.freewebs.com/mikesnake

Thanks Mike, my next question to the forum was going to be what the actual definition of melanistic is. Regardles I think she'll make a fun project not only being so dark but I also have a tangerine male with her that is also a wild caught hondo. So fresh blood lines and like Terry posted earlier getting her mixed with some albino blood might make for a very interesting snake. Thanks everyone for all the help and info, maybe I might have something really cool in a few years. Matt

Melanism is MORE black than normal.....It is a very loosely defined trait in captive breeding because of its variability. A good example of this trait occurs in garters and a couple other lines of kings(including the mex black). The trait is hardly ever complete thus allowing for ID....and many times only occurs later in life(hognose for example). Michael,I havent argued with you online for months,lol,so rest assured I havent forgotten you! Just some friendly jousting,Jeff

Matt, it is not uncommon to see some of the large tropical milks get overall dark the bigger they get. I've had some large polyzona from Northern Guatemala that were almost black like that, and have even seen one large micropholis that was like that also. Many breeders back in the late 1980's when tricolors were big thought the large dark, heavily black-tipped animals as undesireable because they were "uglier" than the brightly colored ones, so they weren't that popular. While gaigeae unquestionably goes through an ontogenetic change from tri-colored to jet black, some of the other tropical subspecies also darken up as large adults, although not to the extreme gaigeae does. I currently have some similarly dark adult hondurensis, and they are neat animals.

Scott Ballard