Low diffusion Fire progression.

Raven has turned into a shark. Or a king snake I guess I should say. Everything that goes into her cage is considered food and at risk of being tasted. She is my only corn who actually bites. Once she's out she's a little nervous, and never really seems to calm down as much as the others, but never bites outside of the cage. She is now approaching 2 years old, is 3'3" (if I remember correctly) and just under 250 grams. Her color does seem to still be developing, but much more slowly now.

Here are some pictures from January that my friend took with a proper camera:

Here are a couple of pictures I took in April with my cell phone. Does she look like a good weight to you guys? I'm not so good at telling if she's maybe gotten a little chunky. Haha

She looks absolutely beautiful. She doesn't look chunky to me.

Originally Posted by hypnoctopus

She looks absolutely beautiful. She doesn't look chunky to me.

Thank you.

Raven shed a few days ago, but we just haven't had any sun until today. I took her outside for a little update photo shoot, and I think her color has gotten more intense even since January, so I thought I'd update her thread. Her sides have pretty much diffused out, you can hardly see any side pattern anymore, and her belly is almost solid orange now especially towards the tail. I realized I didn't get any that were in focus of the underside of her neck, where we weren't sure if we saw belly checkers, so I'll need to get some of those still. And while she is not quite solid colored, her saddles and ground color are close enough that I am quite happy with how she has turned out. So if she gets more diffused/solid colored, that's awesome. If she doesn't, I'm still very pleased.

Picture 1 shows her overall color saturation.
Picture 2 shows her belly.
Picture 3 shows her head.
Pictures 4 and 5 are an attempt to show how faint her side pattern is. It's difficult with shiny snakes in the sunlight, so the last one is in the shade, sort of.

A few more... just because!

Oh ya, and her shed looked like it had hemipenes, so she might be a boy, as it turns out. Not that it makes any difference to me, but interesting note.

Lol! Well that's certainly news. Are you sure they're hemipenes and not sperm plugs? I've been following this progression thread for a while cause I love the color change in fires thanks for the many pictures

Originally Posted by Lexicorn

Lol! Well that's certainly news. Are you sure they're hemipenes and not sperm plugs? I've been following this progression thread for a while cause I love the color change in fires thanks for the many pictures

I talked to her breeder at the show this weekend, and she had kept one of Raven's siblings. Seems she turned out really nicely too. Definitely a fun one to watch developing.

Whether they are hemipenes or sperm plugs it would still indicate a male, however, there is a possibility they could be scent glands which females do have. From all the research I've done on this (which isn't a ton) and everyone's responses to my recent thread about it (search "scabs on shed") it sounds like a pretty good chance they're hemipenes though. And yet I can't quite seem to stop calling her a "she". LOL. Force of habit I guess.

What a gorgeous snake!

It's amazing how the colors have deepened since your snake was a hatchling. I have one that had a dark, coffee-bean-like color when it hatched and now resembles his dad and after 10-11 months has an orange-reddish-brown type of color. Not sure what you might call it.

Very cool thread!