Reptile & Amphibian Forums

We hatched these two out a couple of years ago and out of the whole clutch, they were the only ones that ended up having black in their adult pattern. Neither parent has any visible black, but apparently the gene is in there somewhere so we're hoping to breed these two together in a year or two. The second one seems to be getting darker over the past couple of months, so hopefully when the full adult pattern/colors are reached, we'll have an even cooler looking snake!

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- Jeff -

Forgot to mention...we have a dozen eggs in incubation right now that are full siblings to this pair. Hopefully we'll get some more interesting looking chondros out of it!
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- Jeff -

Very cool, but I wouldn't consider them melanistic.

Thanks for sharing,
Chris
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Christopher E. Smith
Contact
Captive Bred Herps
Wildlife Research & Consulting Services, LLC

What would you consider the second one?
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- Jeff -

A snake.... LOL.

I am not big on naming things displaying unproven phenotypes that fall within normal variation. It is definitely a cool looking snake, but a melanistic snake is dark grey/black. It is hard for me to tell from the photos, but are the dark scales actually black or dark green?

Cheers,
Chris

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Christopher E. Smith
Contact
Captive Bred Herps
Wildlife Research & Consulting Services, LLC

Link didn't work.... try this one:

Melanistic Garter Snake
www.gartersnake.co.uk/mel1.htm

-Chris
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Christopher E. Smith
Contact
Captive Bred Herps
Wildlife Research & Consulting Services, LLC

Makes sense...lol

It hasn't been proven how it's inherited, but it would fall under the category of "mite phase" according to most people I think. He has a lot of full black scales, but there is a lot of variation in the shade of green present too. Some of the scales are dark green, but next to the true black ones they don't look all that impressive.

Actually I took some more photos last night... They're a little dark, but I liked the lighting.

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- Jeff -

Insane demon red eyes!!!