Copperhead - My ??? Motley

[zorro]

You might talk to some of those guys over in Germany, like Stephen, there are some of those red caramels and butters from a line over there.
JOhn

 

[RavenSpirit360]

WOW!!! Beautiful, and weird how it looks like an amel from two butters..

 

[MysticExotics]

He's pretty Jess! Are you going to pair him with anyone to see what you get? (I see Nate is hinting at it....LOL)

 

[Susan]

Where did the parent butter mots come from? Any chance, way back, of a touch of emoryi blood in the line? He looks like a creamsicle motley and could be a "throw-back". It happens sometimes. Some examples are white German shepherds, white Boxers and lemon German Short-haired Pointers (my parents bred those). Those colors are from way back when the breeds were being created and are not accepted in the breed standards. "Recently", at least the white dogs are being accepted by breeders, but that wasn't always the case. For hundreds of years, "throw-backs" were often killed as soon as they were born. No matter how much selective breeding you do, those genes sometimes find a way to show up.

 

[Tom Tuttle]

Where did the parent butter mots come from? Any chance, way back, of a touch of emoryi blood in the line? He looks like a creamsicle motley and could be a "throw-back". It happens sometimes. Some examples are white German shepherds, white Boxers and lemon German Short-haired Pointers (my parents bred those). Those colors are from way back when the breeds were being created and are not accepted in the breed standards. "Recently", at least the white dogs are being accepted by breeders, but that wasn't always the case. For hundreds of years, "throw-backs" were often killed as soon as they were born. No matter how much selective breeding you do, those genes sometimes find a way to show up.

Parents came from Frank Pinello as yearlings.

 

[carnivorouszoo]

What an amazing snake. The first half of him looks alot like my amel mot het caramel stripe girl, especially in the hatchling photo, only instead of all reddish she is turning a nice soft orangey pink with a yellowy orange ground color. Really neat.

 

[Jessicat]

Copperhead is hot!

The stripey tail is on almost all my motley animals, so i guess its normal.

Cool cool, just wondering!

I wonder if it is something similar to the effect of a "red" factor, and the expression it takes in butters produces darker, "redder" (lol) butters? Or it's just an extremely dark butter?

I really don't think he's a Butter. When I first got him, people were pretty adamant that he was not a Butter, he's just so Orange!

I suppose I'll read up on the "red coat" factor and look at German examples, as John suggested.

Any chance, way back, of a touch of emoryi blood in the line? He looks like a creamsicle motley and could be a "throw-back". It happens sometimes.

Thanks for the information, Susan. People have suggested Emoryi before, but Frank Pinello was/is a pretty reputable breeder.
Also, if one parent was Emoryi wouldn't more of the clutch look like Copperhead?

Man, I was going to get a female from this clutch, but went with an RO female instead. I really wish I'd gotten a female as part of the pair now though!

 

[ceduke]

He's a stunner!! What a great looking snake!

 

[pridecity]

I was thinking the same thing as Susan. Guess it may remain a mystery?

 

[Susan]

Thanks for the information, Susan. People have suggested Emoryi before, but Frank Pinello was/is a pretty reputable breeder.
Also, if one parent was Emoryi wouldn't more of the clutch look like Copperhead?

Yes, Frank is a very reputable breeder, however, if you've read about or had experience with "throw-backs", the genetics involved could have been included 100 or more generations back. And no, there doesn't have to be any other clutchmates that look like that. In fact, Copperhead could be the only one like him in 20 generations.

Or Copperhead could have been the result of a spontaneous mutation, possible in the one copy of the caramel gene where it reverted closer to normal. All it takes is one nucleic acid out of place to mess the whole thing up.

 

[Reptileman81]

I had this same issues with a trio I had. I believe they had Emoryi blood in them. They as well as there babies looked very similar to your mystery and the pic of its father. If I can get my hands on a good camera I will take some comparison pics for you of 2 of the baby/juvi I still have. My girl friend broke my camera though so for now I can not be of help. But These guys look just like that Mystery of yours.

 

[Jessicat]

Yes, Frank is a very reputable breeder, however, if you've read about or had experience with "throw-backs", the genetics involved could have been included 100 or more generations back. And no, there doesn't have to be any other clutchmates that look like that. In fact, Copperhead could be the only one like him in 20 generations.

Or Copperhead could have been the result of a spontaneous mutation, possible in the one copy of the caramel gene where it reverted closer to normal. All it takes is one nucleic acid out of place to mess the whole thing up.

Thanks for the information Susan, that is very informative. If he does have Emoryi blood then I don't really think I want to experiment with breeding him. I'm not all that interested in creating non pure Corns.

It's a kunundrum though, because I won't know until I breed him!!

If I breed him to a homo Caramel and he actually has Emoryi blood, what will the results be?

 

[Susan]

Thanks for the information Susan, that is very informative. If he does have Emoryi blood then I don't really think I want to experiment with breeding him. I'm not all that interested in creating non pure Corns.

It's a kunundrum though, because I won't know until I breed him!!

If I breed him to a homo Caramel and he actually has Emoryi blood, what will the results be?

If you want to get technical, since his parents and all known relatives are considered "pure" cornsnakes, so should he. To continue to use the example of "throw-backs" I am familiar with, a white German Shepherd is still a purebred German Shepherd, a whiter Boxer is still a purebred Boxer, and a lemon German Short-haired Pointer is still a purebred GSHP. They simply don't fit the breed standard, can't be shown without getting major faults and are usually not bred in order to prevent perpetuating the fault in the breed. But recently, some breeders are selecting for the white color, and the white German Shepherd actually is being recognized as it's own breed.

No one can say with any certainty that their corn snakes are 100% "pure". Any one could pick up a pair of wc corn snakes, breed them, and get something that looks like a hybrid. Who knows what might be floating around in the gene pool 100 generations back. Just the fact that corn snakes can breed with other species and produce viable offspring that can reproduce shows that the different species are much closer than we usually consider different species to be. Last I was taught, different species are not supposed to interbreed in the wild, but we know that it happens and the fertility of the resulting offspring is much higher than what I had been taught. I just Googled hybrids and found out that there were many more mammal hybrids than I had knwon, including one that is known to occur in the wild and may actually start to become more frequent in the wild (grizzly bear X polar bear). So basically, go ahead and breed Copperhead as if he was a potential new corn snake morph, which he may very well be, just one that perhaps was "lost" a long ago when the evolutionary tree of the North American colubrids had only one or two branches that were not very diverse.

 

[exar15xe]

Very Cool looking snake very weird thats he was the only one in the clutch that looked like that. Nice pictures

 

[Blubb]

Wow, he has changed by these years. You're a good photographer, I really like these pictures.