This 2011 hatchling male is either a Visual-Het Striped Tessera Mutant, or a merely a Striped Mutant (albeit virtually perfectly striped). Whichever pattern mutation he turns out to be his parents were Tessera Het Blue Motley (aka: Dilute Anery Motley) bred to a Blue Motley. Therefore, this snake is het for Dilute and Anery (aka: Blue).
Most Commonly Used Name: Striped
Mode of Genetic Inheritance: Recessive
Morph Type: Single recessive Mutation
The pattern gene mutation, Stripe, has been demonstrated in virtually every commonly kept snake species. Of course, striping is the predominant wild-type pattern for many snake species (i.e. garter, ribbon snakes, yellow rat snakes). In so much as pattern and behavior are linked – since cryptosis is the primary survival behavior of most blotched snakes and speed of flight is primary in most striped snakes – it would be highly unlikely for striped mutant corns to thrive in the wild. Snakes with blotched patterns benefit from coiling up in the forest undergrowth where they are reasonably camouflaged. Since a striped mutant corn snake would have the primary instinct to remain motion-less, imagine how fast it would be killed and/or eaten if it looked like a coiled rope in an otherwise chaotic ground-scape?
At this time, there are at least two striped-type corn snake mutants that are not allelic to the original Striped mutation (not counting the allelic Striped Motley); Terrazzo and Tessera. Tessera usually demonstrates heavy tessellation pattern on the sides which is never seen on Terrazzo or Striped mutants. Both Striped and Motley mutants are alleles of the same chromosome locus, but those are the only others . . . so far. Hence, Terrazzo mutants (formerly called GRANITE corns) owe their appearance to a mutation on a locus other than that of Striped and Motley, so when you breed a Terrazzo mutant to a Striped mutant, neither of them are demonstrated in the progeny. Presuming both parents of such unions possess no gene copies of other mutations, all the babies produced from Striped X Terrazzo mutants would be wild-type phenotypes. Both Striped and Terrazzo mutations are capable of producing nearly pattern-less individuals.
Some corn snake keepers and breeders are unimpressed with the often bland appearance of Striped corns, but if you endeavor to make striped versions of other mutations, you must start with a Striped mutant. Like so many corn snake morphs that are compounds of stripes and other colors and/or patterns, the Striped mutation often does more than just change the pattern. Frequently, the overall contrast and/or coloration is also altered in the compound product.
In summary, the primary feature of this mutation (the striping) is highly variable in color-saturation, width, length, clutter, contiguity, breaking, restarting, vanishing, and even absence. Most Striped mutants have relatively consistent stripe width (see Striped VS Striped Motley comparison image below). Expect the belly to be devoid of the classic corn snake checkering, but some colors and markings can be seen on some individuals. These are usually relegated to dark stippling and/or one or multiple shades of the predominant body color of the snake. It’s not uncommon for some Striped corns to have white bellies from the chin to half way back toward the tail, and fade into a pale version of the predominant body color for the remainder of the belly, including the tail. Some have tiny black flecking over part of all of the belly, but never checkering. The most common belly pattern I’ve seen in Striped corn mutants is color-less with traces of black stippling, usually following an elongate direction or stream.
A comparison photograph of a Striped Amel corn and a Striped Amel Motley corn are shown below, so you can see the main distinction between stripes. In this image, you can see that the pattern schemes are essentially reversed. The Striped corn on the left has relatively little pattern zones (striping) relative to overall color and pattern, compared to the striped motley on the right that has very little ground color zone. The Striped Motley on the right essentially has a linear zone of ground coloration between contiguous dorso–lateral striped markings. The width of ground color zone between the dorso-lateral pattern stripes is the basic way to distinguish between Striped corns and Striped Motley corns. BTW, Stripe and Motley are alleles of the same Chromosomal locus, but Motley is demonstrated as dominant over Stripe.
