Picking a Lavender Baby

Hi all!

I've last written on this forum in the snakes wanted section, looking for a retired adult snake to keep as a pet. Well, after searching for that so long to no avail and missing out on so many potential snakes, I decided to get a baby and be in it for the long haul after all.

So, of course I want the snake I couldn't afford 19 years ago when I first got into corn snakes: a lavender! But this morph has come a long way since then. I really love that purple cast, and lighter coloring rather than the darker, more grey-like coloring.

So, my questions:

• Can I judge the baby snakes I'm seeing to guess at how they may change by the time they're an adult?
• If so, will darker saddles mean darker adults, whiter backgrounds mean greys will be prominant, or is that not a good measure?
• Will hets indicate any visible phenotype (for example, lavender het strawberry making for a very slightly pinkish lavender even though it's not a hypo?)
• Will images of the parents really indicate strongly what the hatchling will grow up to be? Or is that not very reliable?

I figure the answer could be that I can't tell and that's the fun of the lavender gene, but I also know that of all the places, this is the community to ask.

I'm looking on Morph Market and definitely open to breeders here, and found a few--they are both a darker mocha-brown from the images with very light/white-looking backgrounds, and I'm unsure if that is going to be more what I'm looking for, or less.

Thank you for any insight! And while I am looking for a snake now and open to any that may be available here, if you want to convince me to wait with your own stock or project plans, I'm open to that too

The best you can do to try to predict what a hatchling lavender corn snake would trend to as a mature snake is to look at both parents (assuming both parent are lavenders and not a multi-morph lavender morph, I.e. Opal, etc.). But if both lavender parents are on the opposite ends of the lavender spectrum (one very contrasty and the other unicolor) then good luck as it could turn out either way or anywhere in between. If the parents are very similar then you can assume you will have a good chance the hatchling will look similar but not always.
Heck, when Serpenco hatch the first known lavender they gave it the name mocha based on the coloration not knowing at the time that adult lavenders would never be mistaken for a mocha color.
Good luck!

I remember learning of that! So basically, if a lavender's parents were both het pairings, there's probably no good way to know. You need two lav parents. Interesting! It's really wild, the variation I've seen in images so far.

Often male lavenders have richer coloration than females. See if you can contact Ryan Ferrell. I haven't purchased from him personally, but he produces some killer lavender corns.

hypnoctopus said:

Often male lavenders have richer coloration than females. See if you can contact Ryan Ferrell. I haven't purchased from him personally, but he produces some killer lavender corns.

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Thank you for the tip! That was one of the people I was talking to about his lavenders--he had no visual parents to show me, though, since they were both hets, which made me wonder if I was gambling. But I'm intrigued that his might be the way to go of the options I saw on MM. I was hoping to find examples of his lavenders elsewhere but had no luck. If you know of any, I would love to see!

Given my Love/Hate relationship with the gene, I have been working for years on getting a kink-free line of Lavenders that are also robust eaters. I presently have Lavender Motleys Het for Amel from that project that have been kink-free for 7 years of breeding trials. I'm adding genes to the test colony but it's a slow process. If you are looking for the peachy/pink washed Lavenders then definitely get a male AND something with the Peach gene, either Het or Homo, would add a lot.
Looking at the parents is good advice as to what the hatchlings will look like as an adult.
Good Luck,
Terri

ronlina said:

Thank you for the tip! That was one of the people I was talking to about his lavenders--he had no visual parents to show me, though, since they were both hets, which made me wonder if I was gambling. But I'm intrigued that his might be the way to go of the options I saw on MM. I was hoping to find examples of his lavenders elsewhere but had no luck. If you know of any, I would love to see!

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He posts his lavender projects on Facebook relatively often. Most of his lavender stuff also includes other genes, like sunkissed, but here's one that's just lavender:
https://m.facebook.com/groups/44226284649/permalink/10160049408604650/?sfnsn=mo&ref=share

crackerhead said:

Given my Love/Hate relationship with the gene, I have been working for years on getting a kink-free line of Lavenders that are also robust eaters. I presently have Lavender Motleys Het for Amel from that project that have been kink-free for 7 years of breeding trials. I'm adding genes to the test colony but it's a slow process. If you are looking for the peachy/pink washed Lavenders then definitely get a male AND something with the Peach gene, either Het or Homo, would add a lot.
Looking at the parents is good advice as to what the hatchlings will look like as an adult.
Good Luck,
Terri

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That's really cool that you're working on that project! I've always admired the lavender gene from a distance, but I only recently picked up my first lavenders. I'm really hoping they produce healthy babies! I would love to see pictures of yours!

Here's a pic of my male lavender motley. I haven't photographed the female yet, but she's not nearly as colorful as him.

hypnoctopus said:

He posts his lavender projects on Facebook relatively often. Most of his lavender stuff also includes other genes, like sunkissed, but here's one that's just lavender:
https://m.facebook.com/groups/44226284649/permalink/10160049408604650/?sfnsn=mo&ref=share

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Thank you for this! I had been unable to find his facebook page. I'll ask him for more photos too; I'm assuming he is reputable since he is being mentioned on here, but since I've been majorly out of the loop, I wasn't sure.

crackerhead said:

Given my Love/Hate relationship with the gene, I have been working for years on getting a kink-free line of Lavenders that are also robust eaters. I presently have Lavender Motleys Het for Amel from that project that have been kink-free for 7 years of breeding trials. I'm adding genes to the test colony but it's a slow process. If you are looking for the peachy/pink washed Lavenders then definitely get a male AND something with the Peach gene, either Het or Homo, would add a lot.
Looking at the parents is good advice as to what the hatchlings will look like as an adult.
Good Luck,
Terri

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Thanks for this, Terry. I guess since I'm only looking for pet-keeping I'm not too concerned about kinks, but I also think it's important to have healthy snakes and am also glad you're working on that project. I suppose I'm not pining for the peach color (though am happy about it), but more wanted to avoid the very dark/anery looking examples I saw online for some lavenders. Though, honestly, they're all going to be such pretty snakes, I know. I'm so intrigued by the lavender genetics and what was discovered after producing scaleless lavenders. It's an incredibly interesting morph to me there, but also pretty.

hypnoctopus said:

Here's a pic of my male lavender motley. I haven't photographed the female yet, but she's not nearly as colorful as him.

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What a pretty snake! And I even am happy with a washed-out coloring to be honest. I really admire what you all are doing with your lavender projects, though, because it seems to be a difficult gene to work with. Honestly, no matter what even the darker ones are pretty to me!

The motley really stands out in the lavenders it seems!

Just to second what has already been said, if you really want to make sure you end up with a "light-colored" lavender (i.e., a distinctly purple snake), your best bet based on my experience would be with combos that reduce melanin. I have 2 subadults, a hypo lavender and an ultramel lavender, that are both quite purple and have no "darker contrasting areas". Good luck with your search

Thanks! That does help. I'll check out my options and see where I get; there is one I'm considering that isn't listed as hypo or ultramel or any other genetics except lavender, but the parents are almost completely white with faded saddles in a way that looks really pretty to me. Both are just lavenders (motleys, though the one I'm looking at has non-motley pattern) according to the seemingly reputable breeder. They may have other genetics going on there in that line, if not just selectively bred, but it'd be interesting to see what happens with the baby if I get that one!