Poll: are you going to call "bloodred" anything else?

[Clint Boyer]

True. A lot of it depends on the breeder. Some hold themselves to much higher standards than others. I think the first time I really saw that in action was when I saw Walter Smith's amazing candycanes at his booth in Daytona. [/QUOTE

So then when someone buys a pair of Walters awesome snakes, breeds them and gets not as nice snakes, if he calls them Candy Canes his standards are in question?

Darin,
No offense taken, I put my opinions out here to be challenged.

But it seems to me that we are wanting to single out the bloodred morph as something unique in the corn world,

Seems to me that it is it's uniqueness that has us in this quandry.

My point in being nit picky about the red is to bring out the fact that we will indeed be put in those exact same circumstances that you and Serp have been pointing out about all of the other morphs.
How red does it have to be? Well with one name for the whole set of mutations involved (even if it's not so red or not as faded or has what amount of red creeping in the white ventral) It is still definable with one name.

 

[mike panic]

Somtimes I think we get a little

too crazy with naming cornsnakes. Why not just keep it the way it is. We all know what it means and what it looks like. If anything, rather than thinking of bloodred "the color", think of it as the color is simply bleeding. To me, thats what it really means anyway. Some with more "BLEEDING" some with less "BLEEDING" If you really have to rename it more appropriately, just take off the red and call them blood corns. Not because of the degree of redness but rather because they all seem to bleed in some amount or another.

OLD NAME/NEW NAME

BLOODRED/BLOOD CORN

ANERY TYPE A BLOODRED/ANERYTHRISTIC BLOOD CORN "A"

PEWTER/ANERYTHRISTIC BLOOD CORN "B"

AMEL BLOODRED/AMEL BLOOD CORN

GHOST BLOODRED/GHOST BLOOD CORN

LAVENDER BLOODRED/LAVENDER BLOOD CORN

HYPO BLOODRED/HYPO BLOOD CORN

STRIPED BLOODRED/STRIPED BLOOD CORN

ANERYTHRISTIC STRIPED BLOODRED/ANERYTHRISTIC STRIPED BLOOD CORN

BLOODRED MOTLEY/BLOOD MOTLEY CORN OR MOTLEY BLOODCORN

AMEL MOTLEY BLOODRED/AMEL MOTLEY BLOOD CORN


you get the idea. Through normal "CORN SLANG" as I like to call it, we will probably drop the corn and just call them Amel Bloods, Anery Bloods, Ghost Bloods, Ect ect. I thin it flows nicely anyway.

I threw in a GHOST BLOOD for the heck of it! Thanks.

 

[carol]

I agree with you Mike, I think it is a good idea going with "Blood" because the colors seem to bleed. I was tempted to post the same thought but I knew I just get the response "But we already established that the colors don't bleed, the background color comes in and overwhelms the blotch color".

Darin, if you like Episkiastic (I had to cut and paste that BTW) because it means "to ecilpse", why not just call them ecilpse corns? I think that would be met with much more acceptance. Again IMHO.

Perhaps we should call them debate corns.:cheers:

 

[mike panic]

I thought that as well Carol

but I figured the heck with it and went ahead and posted my thoughts anyway.

Perception and appearance is everything, and we can go round and round about whether the pattern bleeds or the color over takes this pattern or the pattern overtakes this color blah blah blah. The bottom line is they SEEM to bleed to some degree(at least to me) and we couldnt go wrong with calling them Blood Corns. If you think about it, they call a Pewter PEWTER because it APPEARS to resemble the color of actual Pewter, not because its made from Pewter. Perception & Appearance is everything. I said up above that they seemed to bleed at least to me. I say that because we are after all, talking about my opinions only. However, many people who breed corns who I have spoken to, agree with the fact that the colors SEEM to bleed. Thanks again.

 

[Rich Z]

I think this is not so hard to believe because every argument that has been put forth against "diffused" as a pattern trait is applicable to Motley.

Hmm, actually you left out what I believe may be the most important point of discussion:

* Blood Reds can basically look like normal corns in many respects as babies, however as full adults the pattern will be completely, or mostly so, obscured by the infusion of ground color that overwhelms the pattern.

This does not happen with the Motley. An adult Motley retains the same basic look as it did as a baby. Maybe in some cases not as contrasty, but if you took a photo of a baby, you could still identify it via the pattern when it is a full adult. This also holds true in all of the genetic color combinations that have been merged with the Motley gene that I have observed.

Now granted, this may just be an exercise in hair splitting, trying to determine if Blood Red is actually a color aberrancy or a pattern aberrancy, but the problem is that we have not fully defined ANYTHING in this discussion. Where does color end, and pattern begin? Since pattern is a function of specifically located colors, perhaps we need to step back a couple of steps and make some definitions first, then discuss what fits into those definitions we can agree on. Is the pattern difusing, or is the color infusing?

Even this will get messy, however. Is the "frosted" look "color" or "pattern"? Then explain why.....

 

[Sasheena]

How about FUSION if people don't like the name BLOOD (which was a great simple suggestion btw). Seems to me everyone's talking about a fusion of the pattern with the background color until the mature snake is often not recognizable pattern-wise with the neonate. The demarkations FUSE until you have a Fusion

Thing is people will call it what they want.... what works the best for everyone will probably become the industry standard, regardless of the subtle genetic nuances involved.

I do think that it is important, with so many different hypo and anery type genes out there, that a person who is selling a snake they've bred can name what type of hypo it is, and the specific genes, especialy the more genes the animal has!

 

[gardenmum]

I agreewith Mike

and had been thinking the same thing. I think that calling them by their name with blood at the end is good. Like Amelblood, Aneryblood, lavenderblood, etc. It is easy to say and flows well and when you hear it you know what it means. I don't think it would be any more difficult to explain to a new person what an Aneryblood was then to explain to them what a Diffused Anery was, and saying that is both a mouthful and I still feel, sounds like the anery is going to blow up. I have only been in corns for a year and a half and I had no problems learning and understanding what a bloodred was and what it's charectoristics were. All I did was study info on them, ask questions and listen to talk, just like I had to to learn what constituted an anery or charcoal. Calling them Diffuse, in my opinion, won't change the fact that you have to learn what it is and why it is what it is. And I also don't think Diffused is a very sellable name either. If I were to go to a table and see a stack of Diffused Amels and the one next to it had Amelbloods, I would be more inclined to go for the Amelbloods. In my opinion, naming a product is as improtant as the product itself and Diffused just doesn't sound "appetizing". And I think that is my biggest problem with this name. It just sounds clunky.
We all know what the bloodred is, maybe it is not the "best" name by some standards, but it is an established name that has been around for a while and is known.
So, unless something else comes along that really makes you stand up and say "Yea, that's IT", I still vote for keeping the bloodred a bloodred and shortening the others to Amelblood, etc.

 

[Serpwidgets]

Just for fun...

According to Webster's:

-----

Diffuse (verb)

1
a : to pour out and permit or cause to spread freely
b : EXTEND, SCATTER
c : to spread thinly or wastefully

2 : to subject to diffusion; especially :
to break up and distribute (incident light) by reflection

-----

Obviously, "diffused" is more appropriate.

-----

I wrote a little program to "diffuse" an image.

It's basically like taking a Monopoly box, filling the bottom with a layer of colored marbles to make a pattern, and then slapping the bottom a few times to rearrange them a bit.

In the end, there are just as many marbles of each color as there were to start off, they are just scattered position-wise.

I know everyone gets a different picture from a word or words. Here's what I see:

I love how the pattern just dissolves. Reminds me of my pewter.

Note that I specifically made it diffuse the sides more than the dorsal saddles, to make it a more accurate portrayal.

 

[Rich Z]

Hmm, why not turn the names around to be consistent with the historical name of BloodRed?

BloodAmel, BloodAnery, BloodCaramel, BloodLavender? I guess we could call the lighter examples as BloodOrange?

Or does that sound clunky too?

 

[Drizzt80]

I don't think that is anyones REAL arguement here.

Actually I do believe it has been stated in those terms by a couple of people. (Don't want to name names, as I don't want to come off as finger pointing, which is NOT my intent, but I have read those posts.)

So are you OK with the "I like diffuse better and I understand what it means so I am going to start using it" arguement? The arguement for it is really no more trivial than the one against it.

I agree completely, but as a person who has worked in the retail pet industry for over 10 years, it's not about what I understand, it's about what I have to 'waste' time explaining to someone. The simpler the better, I would view 'diffuse' as simpler to explain. A Pewter would be a charcoal (or anery B) diffuse, a Bloodred would be a normal diffuse, etc.

it will still take some time to describe what a butter diffuse is.

It takes time to explain what just about every morph is! My whole point towards being in this discussion is that I just can't stand the discrepency in naming something an Anery A Bloodred! It's such a contradiction of language! (I also have followed these discussions for more insight into the genetics, Thanks especially to Serp and the others.)

Its is a lot of trouble to really get nowhere. Its not like we will stick a new name on and all the newbies will suddenly be blessed with more understanding.

Agreed! That will NEVER happen, especially after my experiences with people! (Try explaining to a lady she cannot give her goldfish Pepto cause it looks bloated.)

"Why does my diffuse corn look like the bloodred on page 969", or now we will have to "correct" people when they sell their "bloodreds" from a Pewter X Bloodred pairing. And don't forget the many many posts we will get asking "What is the difference between a diffuse and a bloodred".

I assume you meant 'doesn't look like the bloodred on page 969' I would answer that the same way people are told their Okeetee (or insert other morph here) doesn't look like the one on page 970. Variation!

I would assume a Pewter x Bloodred would give bloodreds het for charcoal since a pewter would be a charcoal bloodred . . . or have I not been following the genetics properly?

Diffuse/Episkiastic is a pattern/color? mutation causing the snakes blotch markings on the sides especially to fade or blend into the surrounding color. There is also a plain belly with variable amounts of pigment creeping in from the sides. A bloodred is actually a diffuse normal cornsnake with varying degrees of intensity in the red.

Kinda like that Okeetee you're looking at can have varying thicknesses to it's borders. Or that normal corn you were looking at, the one with a more silver background, that could be called a miami by some breeders, but is really just a normal cornsnake genetically.

BTW carol, I like your idea of eclipse corn.

How red does a bloodred have to be? In my opinion, red. How intense the red is would indicate the quality of the bloodred to me, and my personal tastes. That will end up being just as variable to everyone purchasing the snakes themselves. Same goes with pewters, how silver does it have to be to be a pewter?

Variability is what makes the different morphs fun. I like an amel leaning more towards a sunglow. Others like amels leaning more towards candy canes. And yet others prefer an amel leaning towards reverse okeetee. The FACT remains they are all still amels. Genetically the 'poor mans' bloodred is still the same as the 'standard' bloodred (again, whose standard?). That is if we have even an inkling of what the genetics are actually doing.

The 'standard' bloodred takes us full circle to the beginning of the discussions about this snake being called a bloodred when there was only a few snakes of red color showing this genetic trait. Joe you make a good point that the name bloodred has been around for 20 years or more. I wasn't into corns then, but what other color morphs were around at that time? If I recall, Snows haven't been around too much longer than that . . .maybe ten more? Point is, look what bloodred is getting mixed with TODAY, and I go back to the contradiction of naming a gray snake an Anery A Bloodred or a Yellow snake a Butter Bloodred.

D80

 

[carol]

I would assume a Pewter x Bloodred would give bloodreds het for charcoal since a pewter would be a charcoal bloodred . . . or have I not been following the genetics properly?

Well that all depends on if a Pewter is a Charcoal Bloodred or if it is a Diffused Charcoal. Your above statement would be wrong if we adopted the name change (which was the scenerio I was simulating). You could either get Bloodreds or Diffused, you just wouldn't know what until they got old enough and either did or did not develop red.
I think "Blood" is the only practical solution. I even like the sound of Blood Orange Rich!
I am not against change, I am just curious what everyone's motive is for changing it? I assume it is to make things easier, but I think a more drastic name change would create more questions than it would answer.

 

[gardenmum]

Rich

I see your point but, yeah, I don't think it rolls off the tongue as well...so, yeah, clunky.
LOL....BloodOrange, sounds like some kind of weird drink.


Dritz,

I believe Carol said what she meant to say with ""Why does my diffuse corn look like the bloodred on page 969", ".
I believe you will find she is saying that a person will be sold a Diffused corn and then see a bloodred corn in, say, The Cornsnake Manual and say, "hey, how come mine looks like the bloodred but it isn't a bloodred?" So the newbie will be asking everyone why? OR they will simply think the person who sold it to them sold them the wrong morph. I have to agree with her, there is a lot of info out there already with pictures of the bloodred and it is labled as such. This could cause some real confussion.
And, if you agree that changing the name won't help in Newbies understanding it any better, than I don't understand the need for such a change.


What I don't see is why each one can't eventually have their own name such as Pewter. So how do you describe a Pewter to someone.....are you going to say it has diffuse in it's genes? So, now, what is diffuse, you will need to desribe that. And how are you going to describe it? Probably the same way as you would describe the original morph that you mixed in to get Pewter which is, let's see....ahh..bloodred.
Or are you going to say it has diffuse bloodred in its genes? In which case you are using the bloodred name and still have to describe the bloodred.

To me it all boils down to what is any morph and that they all need to be describe no matter what and you can't get away from that. And to switch horses in the middle of the stream could very well cause one to get very wet. Especially when there is already pictures and info on the morph in previous liturature.

 

[carol]

Thanks Dianne, yes I did mean exactly what I typed. ;-)

The one disadvantage to them all having different names is that people new to the hobby will not understand that their "Trundlefart" corn (Lav Blood/Diffused) and "Fartrundle" (Carmel Blood/Diffused) corn will produce non "normal" offspring. Then again..... Corn genetics is not always something easily understood anyways. If a person really wants to know what it all means, they will find out. Regardless of the three little letters that will send them into the pits of misunderstanding. RED

 

[carol]

OK, I had to drop the ball last night, I just got too tired to be able to explain what I was trying to say....
Very few people who are interested in corn morphs will only want to learn about "diffuse" corns. They will want to know how lavendar works, how carmel works, anery and so on. And even if we change the name, I gather everyone is in favor of still keeping a line of almost solid RED animals that can actually be allowed to be called Bloodreds or at least Bloodred Diffused. Those people will still want to know what a Bloodred Diffused is and we will STILL have to explain that a Bloodred Diffused is an animal that has the seemingly simple recessive pattern trait and is selectively bred for color. We will still have to explain that when they mix thier Bloodred Diffuse with other morphs or normals that the offspring will most likely loose some of that red color. So we don't really get to skip the step that everyone is trying to avoid. Once a person has a CORRECT understanding as to what a Bloodred corn is (and again even with a name change they will still want to know) they will understand how it could react when you mix and match. Once they have an idea of what anery, carmel, or lav does to cornsnake color, and how the bloodred pattern and color are inherited... They will know that an Anery Blood won't be a color as red as blood. I don't know, perhaps it is because I understood bloodred and anery before anery bloodreds hit the market, but when I first heard the term I never expected to see a red animal.
Right now we find ourselves having to explain to people what Bloodred is, if we change the name, we will find ourselves having to explain what a bloodred is, what a diffuse is, and all the grey areas inbetween.

 

[gardenmum]

Carol

You are welcome.

And I personally agree with you. I don't think of a 'red' animal because of the use of the name. I know I have said it already, but I still think just putting the word blood on the end and dropping the word red says it all. And once you know what a lav is and how the bloodred gene works, you know what it is. Nothing can change the fact that you have to learn what the bloodred or Diffused gene does to a corn to know what it is and how it could possibly affect the different morphs and the breedings of such.

 

[Darin Chappell]

I've said all I can on this to try to explain why I believe what I do in relation to this question, and I have no capacity to change anyone's mind ... let alone everyones' minds!

So, let me just say that I intend on following through pretty much as I have outlined earlier, because, in my opinion, it is the only option that makes any sense to me. People name things all the time for much less of a reason than I have set forth here, and we all just understand that "that guy" is wierd! LOL I'll suffer that burden, if need be.

All my babies, with the pattern mutation we have heretofore most commonly identified with the bloodred morph, that I produce will be identified as animals, which are "episkiastic." There is absolutley nothing untrue about that, because it is as honest a description of them as amelanistic, anerythristic, or hypomelanistic are for those animals. Whether anyone else describes those snakes in the same way or not, or whether that DESCRIPTION ever gets adopted as an actual name for the pattern mutation, I have no idea nor way to influence the outcome.

All of my line-bred, red epi corns will be listed as "bloodreds" pure and simple.

All epi corns homozygous for charcoal will simply be "pewters."

Just as soon as new names are coined for epi corns homozygous for lavender, carmel, anerythrism, amelansim, snow, amber, butter, ghost, phantom, and/or anything else, I will certainly adopt that name for that combination immediately.

I have never been too interested in naming or renaming a morph in all of this. I have only and always been interested in naming a pattern mutation we all know about, talk about, and can identify ... but have never named.

Thanks for the debate, everyone. It has been a lot of fun!!!

 

[Clint Boyer]

Darin,
I don't mean to beat a dead horse but without knowing exactly how even line-bred Bloodreds will develope and the fact that they aren't red yet, how will you know they will meet your own criteria of what a Bloodred should be? WHEEW! Was that one sentance?

 

[mike panic]

Im calling them Hypo Bloods, Amel Bloods, Anery Bloods, Lavender bloods and so on so forth. As Rich said, even if you switched it around to say Blood Amel, Blood Hypo, Blood Anery, that would still be everything we look for in a name. And people would still know what it meant. Its catchy, and BASICALLY describes what changes the snake will undergo. If I have to explain to someone who is buying one of my hatchlings what that means, I will. I dont think I will ever have to do that though. In my opinion, it is the best choice for these snakes.


Also, lets keep it simple. After all, we are not scientists. Most of us are laymen. If you start calling these animals greek names and names that are so scientific that you need a dictionary to find out what they mean, you will force people to lose interest.

In my own observations, and take this for what it is worth, some of the people who post on a frequent basis seem to have a very high level of intellect. Thats fine and kudos to you but really, you are only scaring the average Joe with the high powered words and meanings. If we keep it as simple as possible, we will all enjoy the hobby together.

 

[Darin Chappell]

Clint,

That is a valid point, and it is one that I will have to address, I'm certain. I will look at the animal's pattern to determine if it is episkiastic or not, then, if it is, and it is not amel (or homozygous for something else) and has the classic signs that show the probability to being a good bloodred (skull head pattern, few to no lateral markings even as a hatchlings, and evidence of the red coloration beginning ... all of which usually begins to present itself by the time a hatchling is sold, in my limited experience), THEN I'll label it as a bloodred instead of just a normally colored episkiastic corn.

If I stay true to my standard as outlined above, who can be hurt but me? The worst thing that can happen is that I sell an episkiastic as a normally colored animal and it matures into a brilliant bloodred! It's really no worse than buying an amel and having it turn out to look like the the best reverse okeetee around in a few years. You got an excellent example at a reasonable price ... Kudos!



Mike,

I understand what you are saying too, but I know of at least five different Greek-based words that we commonly use in everyday description of corns:

Amelanism
Anerythrism
Hypomelanism
Heterozygous
Homozygous

If someone ever develops a black corn, will it not be hypermelanistic? In this thread alone, we have talked about bloodred possibly being hypererythristic ... I don't recall anyone pulling their hair out for want of a Greek to English dictionary.

It is true that I study Koine Greek, so I admit having a fondness for those terms, but I also speak some Spanish and Tsalagi. I ONLY chose that Greek term, because it accurately represents what is going on on the pattern mutation; it cannot be confused with any current morph, since it is totally unique in nature; and it rests on the tradition we already have in using Greek based terms as seen above.

I am certainly not smarter than very many people (if any at all ), so I am not trying to be puffed up in anybody's sight. I'm really sorry, if it looked otherwise. The last thing I would want to do is try to pass myself off as anything near an expert on corns. I certainly am not.

 

[ecreipeoj]

Bloodred Corns forever!

“People don’t like the Bloodred name” Which people? I like the Bloodred name and Blood Corns, Bloods, Lav Bloods and so forth. Lavender Bloods, I wish! Diffused Lavenders, Never!

I think the majority of people like the name Bloodred Corn Snake that has been used for decades and they already use Bloods or Blood Corns when referring to them. It has been used in books and on price list so many times, I can not possibly see it changing. It is already Corn slang. You can put something in print once and it really doesn’t mean anything, but put it in print thousands of times over many, many years and it is unchangeable.

A few people, a small minority of people, do not like the Bloodred name. They are trying to change horses in mid stream and are going to get wet! Even they can not agree on a name, because there is no replacement possible for one that already exist and has been used for a very long time. They are Bloodred Corns and this can not be changed. They will end up getting back on the bloodred horse which is strong and will continue for another 20 + years. Are we really at mid stream? Not likely. I think we are just getting started. It is very nice to see such a strong interest in Bloods again.

There will be many Bloodred Corns on the tables in Daytona this year. People will be looking for them, Amel Bloods, Anery Bloods and so forth. Can you imagine who will have to be doing the explaining if they put Anery “Epi” Corns or Amel “Diffused” Corns on their table. Not only will they be trying to explain what an Epi or Diffuse Corn is, but why they are not trying to pull off a scam. That is all they would be doing the entire show, while they see the Bloodreds selling on the table next to them.

Bloodred Corns are already known by thousands, upon thousands of corn snake enthusiasts, and in general by people interested in reptiles. I do not want to try to explain to all of them, why I am calling a Bloodred Corn something different. They will think I am nuts!

I was looking through Bill and Kathy Love’s “Corn Snake Manuel” again, and always marvel at the Bloodred pictured on page 51. The photo is not exactly right you can tell, but she is a very, very dark brownish maroon. She is not “RED”, but most definitely a Bloodred Corn. Cross her with a mutant morph and you will end up having something more than a Normal Diffused Corn or Anery Epi Corn.

Nice debate! Just my opinion and nothing more. I would be totally shocked if a name change took place and was excepted and used. It seems like trying to change Americans to Diffusians or Epians. Americans means something whether or not it is descriptive or not, no matter what color they happen to be.