king snake influence in tessera morph?

Kevin - the first one looks identical to a tessera. However, I'd say the second one still looks like a hybrid to me. It definitely has corn characters, but the saddles are wrong and the head pattern is more king. Are both of those of jungle corn origin?

I guess the weird snake could be some odd wide stripe kind of thing. What were we calling that, Connect Four??

Why, if there is a DNA map for every other animal under the sun, including many snakes, is there not one for the cornsnake?

There isn't a DNA map for every other animal under the sun. The majority of the human genome was done at my university, the University of California at Santa Cruz. It took them years to accurately compose the human genome. Drosophila (fruit flys) are another organism that has had it's genome mapped, but that's because it's the guinea pig of molecular tests. There isn't even close to 1% of the species on Earth with their genomes mapped.

Kevin S. said:

Let's say someone breeds an albino cal king to a normal corn. Breed those het jungles together and you get some albino jungles. Breed one of the albino jungles to a normal corn and you get super corns het albino...continue on with this pattern for a few generations and eventually you'll get albino snakes that have the scalation and other morphological characteristics of a corn, but they're not amel corns-they got their albinism from a cal king ancestor. It'd be much simpler with a dominant trait (like tessera) since you'd have no hets to deal with and could just breed a funky patterned offspring to a pure corn and get more of the same pattern with progressively more corn influence each time.

IF the dominant pattern mutation came from a cal king or resulted from the combination of corn and king genes, that's how it would be done. So the question isn't how could you breed away the king traits and keep the pattern, but whether or not a king would be necessary to originate the pattern in the first place. We'll never know at this point and as I said before, I don't see it being a very critical question regardless...makes for some interesting conversation though.

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Sadly enough.....I'm all too familiar with the countless stolen simple recessive mutations like amelanism in the hobby mainstream. That doesn't even begin to explain the things I mentioned. Cal. king striping would be often lost immediately when successive generations of corns were introduced like they have been. The striping isn't even predictable in any given genuine Cal. king clutch, much less when constantly diluted with more cornsnakes. It also doesn't explain the solid 50-50 ratio clutches either like I have kept addressing with no replies from the hybrid theorists.

Nanci, are you confusing genomic mapping for creating a species phylogeny? If so, then yes, a lot of species have had phylogenies created for them. But even then, it's dependent upon the genes used in the phylogeny whether the phylogeny has any merit. If you use highly conserved genes, then you won't see much difference between sister taxa and it won't tell you anything about the evolutionary history of the species in question. Furthermore, a corn snake phylogeny should eventually get done, but only when someone doing research on corns gets around to writing a grant that justifies analysis as something that will benefit the scientific community. I don't know how a study on all the different color and pattern mutations in corns will net the grant money necessary to conduct such an experiment, unless of course their research is on the origin of pattern mutations (that'd be cool). Even then, if you get a grad student that only identifies and uses three loci versus a post doc or professor that uses ten or more loci in their molecular analyses, you might not be able to answer any of the questions we all have. What it could tell you though is if a larger majority of tessera or ultra-based corns group closer to gray rats and king snakes than any other morphs do. That would the the pentultimate proof necessary to say for sure that those morphs have hybrid origins.

It also doesn't explain the solid 50-50 ratio clutches either like I have kept addressing with no replies from the hybrid theorists.

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Doug, it's the way the gene behaves; it's dominance when in it's heterozygous state that results in those 50-50 ratios. It's really that simple. When we artificially select for the pattern component of the gene, we also select for the way the gene controls which pattern is expressed.

Also, I did address your concern in a very in-depth explanation on the previous page! Dude, you're killin' me! Haha.

I've been on this message board for ten years this month and it happens with EVERY. New. Mutation. But besides this happening every time, this discussion is old hat just with tessera. I think this thread comes up twice a year, and a bunch of photos of snakes that look like kings are presented to convince me. If you want to believe it's a hybrid, that's your prerogative. I don't see the evidence. I've had 5 unrelated (well, non-clutch mates) since '09, plus those they have produced. And I've literally got 25+ years experience keeping getula kings. Admittedly, I've never tried to cross them or kept a hybrid, and 99% of the hybrids I've even seen have been on the Internet. But if these came from Jungles, then think of the scenario... someone outcrossed them to corns over and over. And then sold his only reverse trio as striped motleys on KS to Graham for a few hundred bucks. Or Graham, KJ and Don are liars. Really, there aren't many options in favor of this conspiracy theory.

You must spread some Reputation around before giving it to Chip again

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Someone give me a hand here...

BloodyBaroness said:

That.

When someone does that, people might actually give credence to the theories. There are many morphs/patterns that look similar in certain in different species. That, in and of itself, does not mean they are related/hybrid.

Right now they are just theories and nothing more. Currently there is more evidence to them not being hybrids, than there is for them being hybrids. Could that change? Maybe. Without research, trials and evidence beyond untested look-a-likes, it certainly won't.

At this point who really gives a crap? They are pretty morph that is now mixed with a bunch of others, and the prices are at levels everyone can afford thanks to a dominant gene in a prolific species. Either you like them and breed them or you don't.

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I agree, as soon as someone breeds one of those KNOWN Cal. king x corn hybrids to a Tessera, and they all come out with identical Tessera phenotypes, then it would prove something other than a snake looking intermediate between the two parent species.

Sorry for all the edits to my posts, but my keyboard sucks because MY WIFE (yes dear, I'm telling on you) can't seem to keep her Pepsi off the computer desk. Okay, I'm going now...and I might get murdered...easy dear...

Mitchell Mulks said:

Within a single clutch of bloods you get a clear belly with some lateral color bleeding into the ventral scales (you even have the translucent scales in the center of each ventral scale; which is a 100% way of identifying blood stripes from a stripe het blood x stripe het blood pairing).

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"You know I noticed that myself on one or two of them this year - very off - both parents are bloods, I've never gotten anything but bloods before this year, I didn't make a mistake and mix them to different mates, so I can't explain it. I think it should be a blood, but the belly checkers are a mystery to me."
-Rich Hume

someone outcrossed them to corns over and over. And then sold his only reverse trio as striped motleys on KS to Graham for a few hundred bucks.

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Chip, don't all of us have lines that we work on? Why would someone who works with hybrids work any different? At some point we all get rid of our lines, so why would it even be far fetched that someone worked on a cal king x corn line that led to snakes looking like tessera corns, and then dumped them when they were done? That is a million times more likely than KJ and Don trying to dupe anyone! Hell, I have a line I'm three generations into with mountain kings and I'm about to be rid of them. Guess what, their heads are no longer black, they're pure white. They don't have body rings, instead they have dorsal saddles. They also don't have the normal three colors on the ventral scales, they are in fact pure white ventrals. I've done this in three short generations and they look nothing like a CA mtn king, nor do they even slightly resemble their parental stock. So why is the hypothetical situation I've proposed so crazy when I've done it myself? The only thing I won't do with mine is sell my F3's (as it's illegal), nor represent them as something other than the species they are (something that happens with too much regularity; and I'm saying for the third time now in this thread).

That picture of the leopard rat snakes... wasn't there a corn snake that had that same pattern as the one on top? But breedings of it lead to nothing??
Sorta off topic.. but at the same time.. I also think that these pattern mutations can and will be found across snakes with a common ancestry. I have heard the argument before, and I believe it, that if you can find one color or mutation in a species, you'll also be able find it in another closely related one.

Josh, I'd lump that singular event into the same category that we put paradox snakes in. It doesn't seem to be heritable and it pops up out of nowhere. Even in Rich's statement he said that this is the first one he got that looked like that even though he'd bred the same pair multiple times before. However, with tessera clutches it's common knowledge that they don't have a set ventral pattern, that in fact their ventral pattern can be anything under the sun; and all that variation can be seen in the same clutch. That's not normal, and it's consistent with only tesseras.

DMong said:

That doesn't even begin to explain the things I mentioned. Cal. king striping would be often lost immediately when successive generations of corns were introduced like they have been...It also doesn't explain the solid 50-50 ratio clutches either like I have kept addressing with no replies from the hybrid theorists.

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I don't look at it as a stripe trait from cal kings, though I can see where the example I used was confusing since in that case it would be. IF hybridization is at the root of tesseras, I think it's due to the interaction of the pattern genes in each species. If you look at the jungle corn I posted before with the circleback pattern, you'll noticed I said it's not a motley, though it does have classic motley dorsal pattern on the majority of its body. His mother was a reverse stripe cal king and somehow that made a het motley offspring look like a motley-we just don't know how pattern-altering traits interact across species boundaries in this case.

I can't claim to have all the answers, but I know other breeders have made hybrids with tessera pattern and the tessera mode of inheritance by breeding cal kings to non-tessera corns. Beyond that, I know it was done years before the first tessera corns hit the market. That doesn't prove anything, but it sure does raise some interesting implications.

DMong said:

I agree, as soon as someone breeds one of those KNOWN Cal. king x corn hybrids to a Tessera, and they all come out with identical Tessera phenotypes, then it would prove something other than a snake looking intermediate between the two parent species.

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Last I heard, Donovan Winterburg was planning to do this.

Mitchell Mulks said:

Kevin - the first one looks identical to a tessera. However, I'd say the second one still looks like a hybrid to me. It definitely has corn characters, but the saddles are wrong and the head pattern is more king. Are both of those of jungle corn origin?

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Nanci said:

Kevin, I would say the one snake does look like a Tessera, and the other snake does not look like a [pure] normal corn.

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Sorry for the trick guys, but they're both pure corns. As often as I hear people claim they can tell hybrids from non-hybrids (and they usually do so after they already know a snake's ancestry), it always seems to be a different story when put to the test. Funny thing is, just like in this case, people seem to doubt pure corns more than they catch hybrids based on what I've seen. As much as I'd like to think I have a good eye for it, I know I'd be surprised by some if I tried to guess at a similar game, so please don't think I'm picking on anyone.

What about Steve's Cream Ts? Uber hybrid!

BloodyBaroness said:

Someone give me a hand here...

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Got him for you, Autumn.

Mitchell Mulks said:

No, motleys are not hybrids. I think you're misunderstanding the variation Joe is talking about (variation I also agree about too). Within a single clutch of motleys you get all clear bellies (maybe a little black speckling, but no checkers...with the exception of sunkissed...but those checkers are few and far between). Within a single clutch of bloods you get a clear belly with some lateral color bleeding into the ventral scales (you even have the translucent scales in the center of each ventral scale; which is a 100% way of identifying blood stripes from a stripe het blood x stripe het blood pairing). What you don't get in those examples is what occurs in tesseras. Within a SINGLE CLUTCH you'll have siblings with clear bellies, some with checkers, some completely checkered, and some with the upper half absent of pigment only to have the lower half go to full checkers. That doesn't occur with any other corn morph! It's a marker that's indicative of two genes, both from independent evolutionary origin, that reside at the same loci on sister chromosomes. It's what happens when two genes are having compatibility issues during development; one of the genes is giving instructions for one pattern while the other is giving another. You simply don't see this WITHIN CLUTCHES with any other morph.

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I beg to differ. I got that effect quite commonly in the "milk snake phase" line of Miamis I used to work with. Also got that from my Silver Queen Ghosts more times than I could ever count. And most definitely saw that VERY often in any of the outcrossed Blood Red projects I did. I would be extremely surprised if no one else has experienced this in their own breeding colonies.

Sorry, I was being facetious about the comments concerning those old line genetic traits now being determined as being hybrids based on Joe Pierce's statements. I didn't realize that it wouldn't be self evident.

Carpe Serpentis said:

Entire clutches are not needed to show that some trait can be line bred into an animal and produce progeny that are within a certain guideline. One need only look at the many breeds of dogs that have all been selectively bred to exhibit certain traits to such an extent that these traits are given names such as poodle, zu, pomeranian, klee kai, etc. Man has been breeding hybridizing for a few years now and to think that snakes are one of those animals that for one reason or another has a strong taboo with some when it regards hybridizing is strange to me personally when so many other animals are hybridized without so much as anyone even blinking an eye in comparison. A good breeder can in fact breed any trait into his line and have it breed true after a few generations. Breeding out the unwanted genes can also be done with a rudimentary understanding of genetics and an eye for detail.

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How is selective breeding in dogs any proof of hybridisation? The poodle's curly coat wasn't a trait bred into dogs via hybridisation, it was a coat mutation perpetuated by selective breeding.