Josua
Colubrids rule
With this story I will try to explain as honestly and clearly as possible, with all the information I have received, about the “Ultimate Hypo”.
I bought my original pair in 2006 from Christos Skliris, who is the owner of ABC Reptiles, aka ABC Animalerie and ABC Snakecenter, from France.
His internet site is www.abcsnakecenter.com.
The animals I bought were labelled as 1.0 Ultramel Anery and 0.1 Ultramel het Anery. When I asked about the snakes I was told they were siblings, and according to the salesman one of the parents was a Snow. At this point he was not telling the truth, or he didn’t know better, I will unveil my findings later.
I bought them with full trust, especially since there were not so many Ultramels on the market in 2006 for comparison. I paid 550 Euros for the pair.
Once I had them I took them to Arjan (corns.nl) so he could look at them and his first impression was, “You have bought a Silver Queen and a Crimson?”. Just to let you know that (looking back on it) they didn’t look like typical ultramels.
Later, at Veldhoven (a fair) I bought another Snake from the same salesman, this animal was being sold as an Ultramel. There were 2 females to choose from, one of which was much lighter than the other, I found the lighter one nicer and bought her, but after popping her it turned out to be a male. I swapped her then for the other darker, female, which really was a female.
I think I paid 120 Euros for this snake and hoped that it was maybe an ultra as it was a bit darker. I didn’t breed with this female in 2008 because she did not have the needed size, hence I cannot say much more about this female, which helps not to complicate things even more.
In 2007, at Houten, I bought another trio from the same Salesman, these were sold as Ultra Anerys. These cost 59 Euros each, or a pair for 100 Euros. I got 1.2 for 150 Euros. The male was a non feeder and died 2 months later, the females (one dark and one light) are doing well, and at the rate they are going they should be ready to breed in 2009.
The original pair have developed really well and have been used for breeding in 2008. I had naturally believed that they were Ultramels, so the first pairing was Ultramel Anery male X Amel het Anery female.
The female had been bred the year before with a Hypo Lavender het. anery male. The offspring were all Normals and Anerys, which proved there was no Hypo A gene in the female and that she was 100% het Anery.
The female laid 2 clutches in 2008, a total of about 40 eggs. The offspring were all Normals (some of which looked unusual yellowish, some normal) and Anerys most of which had a very light coloured (almost white as a sheet) background colour, and others a Silver grey background colour. Some of the Anerys look like what you would imagine an Anery Miami looks like.
It has been proven that the male is Homozygote Anery, but that he has no Ultra, Ultramel or Amel in him, if he was an Ultramel Anery then the offspring would have been:
25% amel het. anery
25% snow
25% ultramel het. anery
25% ultramel anery
I have been offering these offspring for sale as Normals het Amel, Anery and “Ultimate Hypo” (ABC Snakecenter Line) for 15 Euros and as Anery het Amel and “Ultimate Hypo” (ABC Snakecenter Line) for 30 Euros.
From this breeding I gave Johan and Niels from SpecialCorns 1.1 Normals and 1.1 Anerys.
I have also paired the Ultramel Anery with its sister the Ultramel het Anery.
This produced 5 very large eggs all of which have hatched. The offspring are 2.3 and can best be described as Hypos with a distinct Black border around the saddles, thicker than normal Hypo A’s have, but they have the typical Hypo belly with very light coloured checkers. Another noticeable thing was that 1 female was a lot lighter than all the other hatchlings. All offspring have almost pitch black eyes, and not the Ruby eyes that an Ultramel should have.
In this case the offspring were also not what they should be, normally you should expect:
12,5% amel
12,5% snow
25% ultramel
25% ultramel anery
12,5% ultra
12,5% ultra anery
Even though there were not very many eggs, it should still have been 5 Ultramels or Ultras, but if you see the eyes, and know about the other pairing with the male then you can safely say they are not Ultramels. These animals have been sold as “Ultimate Hypo” het. anery (ABC Snakecenter Line) for 50 Euros each.
From this clutch I gave Johan and Niels from SpecialCorns 0.1, to test them out with me.
Meanwhile, after the breeding season 2008, I have of course been in touch with the Salesman from ABC Reptiles. He told me the story as he knows it, and this is what he told me:
He bought the Animals a few years ago in America as Ultramels. He could not tell me who he bought them from. Through his own breedings he has also realised that they are not Ultramels. He now calls them “Ultimate Hypos”, Ultimate Anery or Ultimate Ghost. According to him it is a completely new and PURE Pantherophis guttatus gene mutation. He claims that the gene is also co-dominant, like Ultra and Amel. He says it is co-dominant to Hypo A. If you change the Ultra with Ultimate and the Amel with Hypo A then the inheritance is the same. He has yet to put on his homepage the differences between Ultimates and Ultimate Hypos.
The differences that I have seen through my own breeding, and that I clearly saw between the bought Ultramel (2006) and the Ultra Anerys (2007) show that there is a difference between the “Superform” and the “co-dominant form”
What concerns me is after the pairing with the Amel het Anery, you could also see differences in the hatchlings, especially the Normals. Some look like a Normal should look, but others look almost like Hybrids (yes, everybody thought that this word would have fallen long ago) due to the high amount of goldy yellow colouring in them. Since the Amel female was proven not to be Hypo, you would not expect differences to be there between the Normals
These are my thoughts at the moment (September 2008), as I am still not sure about these Animals. I cannot comment on whether they are pure Guttatus or not, as I do not know much about the ancestry of the animals. There seems to be no Lampropeltis blood in them, and other Rat Snake types also does not seem probable, just by the look of my snakes.
I cannot say any more about the genetics of these Snakes, I only know that what the salesman has told me. What he told me fits in to my breeding experiences. Once again I am very curious as to the reason for the differences between the Anerys and Normals. I also know that the Salesman has some animals for sale, the prices and names have been directly taken from his homepage, this is the reason for the quotations marks:
Elaphe Guttata "Ultimate" - 80 up to 120 euro
Elaphe Guttata "Ultimate ghost" - 120 euro
Elaphe Guttata "Ultimate ghost motley pinstripe" - 150 euro
Elaphe Guttata Zig Zag Ultimate - no price named
Since he has the Animals named as “Ultimates”, and the prices are quite high, then he must really believe that he has a new gene, and if so the prices have correctly been increased.
What I do know though is that I have 1.4 animals which should be breedable next year, 1.2 “Ultimate Hypo Anery” or Ultimate Ghost, and 0.2 “Ultimate Hypo” one of which should be het for Anery.
I will test these animals with each other but also with other known Hypo carriers (for example Ghost, Amber, Hypo Lavender).
I hope the breeding results of 2009 will help to shine some light to this puzzle.
If anybody has any questions or notice any mistakes in my thinking, or if somebody has bought any related animals, please feel free to contact me, the more people that have ideas or that breed these snakes, the quicker we should get behind the truth.
Josua Hannink, September 2008.
www.colubrids.nl
[email protected]
www.future-morphs.com (coming soon)
I bought my original pair in 2006 from Christos Skliris, who is the owner of ABC Reptiles, aka ABC Animalerie and ABC Snakecenter, from France.
His internet site is www.abcsnakecenter.com.
The animals I bought were labelled as 1.0 Ultramel Anery and 0.1 Ultramel het Anery. When I asked about the snakes I was told they were siblings, and according to the salesman one of the parents was a Snow. At this point he was not telling the truth, or he didn’t know better, I will unveil my findings later.
I bought them with full trust, especially since there were not so many Ultramels on the market in 2006 for comparison. I paid 550 Euros for the pair.
Once I had them I took them to Arjan (corns.nl) so he could look at them and his first impression was, “You have bought a Silver Queen and a Crimson?”. Just to let you know that (looking back on it) they didn’t look like typical ultramels.
Later, at Veldhoven (a fair) I bought another Snake from the same salesman, this animal was being sold as an Ultramel. There were 2 females to choose from, one of which was much lighter than the other, I found the lighter one nicer and bought her, but after popping her it turned out to be a male. I swapped her then for the other darker, female, which really was a female.
I think I paid 120 Euros for this snake and hoped that it was maybe an ultra as it was a bit darker. I didn’t breed with this female in 2008 because she did not have the needed size, hence I cannot say much more about this female, which helps not to complicate things even more.
In 2007, at Houten, I bought another trio from the same Salesman, these were sold as Ultra Anerys. These cost 59 Euros each, or a pair for 100 Euros. I got 1.2 for 150 Euros. The male was a non feeder and died 2 months later, the females (one dark and one light) are doing well, and at the rate they are going they should be ready to breed in 2009.
The original pair have developed really well and have been used for breeding in 2008. I had naturally believed that they were Ultramels, so the first pairing was Ultramel Anery male X Amel het Anery female.
The female had been bred the year before with a Hypo Lavender het. anery male. The offspring were all Normals and Anerys, which proved there was no Hypo A gene in the female and that she was 100% het Anery.
The female laid 2 clutches in 2008, a total of about 40 eggs. The offspring were all Normals (some of which looked unusual yellowish, some normal) and Anerys most of which had a very light coloured (almost white as a sheet) background colour, and others a Silver grey background colour. Some of the Anerys look like what you would imagine an Anery Miami looks like.
It has been proven that the male is Homozygote Anery, but that he has no Ultra, Ultramel or Amel in him, if he was an Ultramel Anery then the offspring would have been:
25% amel het. anery
25% snow
25% ultramel het. anery
25% ultramel anery
I have been offering these offspring for sale as Normals het Amel, Anery and “Ultimate Hypo” (ABC Snakecenter Line) for 15 Euros and as Anery het Amel and “Ultimate Hypo” (ABC Snakecenter Line) for 30 Euros.
From this breeding I gave Johan and Niels from SpecialCorns 1.1 Normals and 1.1 Anerys.
I have also paired the Ultramel Anery with its sister the Ultramel het Anery.
This produced 5 very large eggs all of which have hatched. The offspring are 2.3 and can best be described as Hypos with a distinct Black border around the saddles, thicker than normal Hypo A’s have, but they have the typical Hypo belly with very light coloured checkers. Another noticeable thing was that 1 female was a lot lighter than all the other hatchlings. All offspring have almost pitch black eyes, and not the Ruby eyes that an Ultramel should have.
In this case the offspring were also not what they should be, normally you should expect:
12,5% amel
12,5% snow
25% ultramel
25% ultramel anery
12,5% ultra
12,5% ultra anery
Even though there were not very many eggs, it should still have been 5 Ultramels or Ultras, but if you see the eyes, and know about the other pairing with the male then you can safely say they are not Ultramels. These animals have been sold as “Ultimate Hypo” het. anery (ABC Snakecenter Line) for 50 Euros each.
From this clutch I gave Johan and Niels from SpecialCorns 0.1, to test them out with me.
Meanwhile, after the breeding season 2008, I have of course been in touch with the Salesman from ABC Reptiles. He told me the story as he knows it, and this is what he told me:
He bought the Animals a few years ago in America as Ultramels. He could not tell me who he bought them from. Through his own breedings he has also realised that they are not Ultramels. He now calls them “Ultimate Hypos”, Ultimate Anery or Ultimate Ghost. According to him it is a completely new and PURE Pantherophis guttatus gene mutation. He claims that the gene is also co-dominant, like Ultra and Amel. He says it is co-dominant to Hypo A. If you change the Ultra with Ultimate and the Amel with Hypo A then the inheritance is the same. He has yet to put on his homepage the differences between Ultimates and Ultimate Hypos.
The differences that I have seen through my own breeding, and that I clearly saw between the bought Ultramel (2006) and the Ultra Anerys (2007) show that there is a difference between the “Superform” and the “co-dominant form”
What concerns me is after the pairing with the Amel het Anery, you could also see differences in the hatchlings, especially the Normals. Some look like a Normal should look, but others look almost like Hybrids (yes, everybody thought that this word would have fallen long ago) due to the high amount of goldy yellow colouring in them. Since the Amel female was proven not to be Hypo, you would not expect differences to be there between the Normals
These are my thoughts at the moment (September 2008), as I am still not sure about these Animals. I cannot comment on whether they are pure Guttatus or not, as I do not know much about the ancestry of the animals. There seems to be no Lampropeltis blood in them, and other Rat Snake types also does not seem probable, just by the look of my snakes.
I cannot say any more about the genetics of these Snakes, I only know that what the salesman has told me. What he told me fits in to my breeding experiences. Once again I am very curious as to the reason for the differences between the Anerys and Normals. I also know that the Salesman has some animals for sale, the prices and names have been directly taken from his homepage, this is the reason for the quotations marks:
Elaphe Guttata "Ultimate" - 80 up to 120 euro
Elaphe Guttata "Ultimate ghost" - 120 euro
Elaphe Guttata "Ultimate ghost motley pinstripe" - 150 euro
Elaphe Guttata Zig Zag Ultimate - no price named
Since he has the Animals named as “Ultimates”, and the prices are quite high, then he must really believe that he has a new gene, and if so the prices have correctly been increased.
What I do know though is that I have 1.4 animals which should be breedable next year, 1.2 “Ultimate Hypo Anery” or Ultimate Ghost, and 0.2 “Ultimate Hypo” one of which should be het for Anery.
I will test these animals with each other but also with other known Hypo carriers (for example Ghost, Amber, Hypo Lavender).
I hope the breeding results of 2009 will help to shine some light to this puzzle.
If anybody has any questions or notice any mistakes in my thinking, or if somebody has bought any related animals, please feel free to contact me, the more people that have ideas or that breed these snakes, the quicker we should get behind the truth.
Josua Hannink, September 2008.
www.colubrids.nl
[email protected]
www.future-morphs.com (coming soon)
