Snake of the Day 08-27-16

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This Cayenne Fire is the result of pairing two Cayenne Fires produced by John Finsterwald of Colorado Corns whose parents were from a Cayenne Fire bred to a Whiteout (Blizzard Bloodred).  I will know in a few months if it’s actually a pied-sided Fire, but I’ve seen this look in many Fires and Bloodreds that did not indicate they were P/S mutants.  Thanks, John, for the awesome project.  No, this one will not be this color for very long.  It will get redder every weeek, until it will finally be almost completely red as an adult.    

Snake of the Day 08-23-16b

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These eggs began hatching the DAY after I left for the NRBE in Daytona Beach earlier this week.  I came home this evening to see these Scaleless Corns slithering around, just begging to be photographed.  Readily identifiable are Caramel and Common-colored Scaleless corns.  After they have fed a few times they will be featured for sale on this web site and on the South Mountain Reptiles FaceBook page.   s

Snake of the Day 08-26-16a

SOTD  FLASHBACK

First, I hope you’re on a coffee break when you open this SMR article because it’s a long one.  Some of you are already aware that there are over 1,000 such informative articles on our web site (www.corn snake.NET) but they are listed chronologically when you click the tab on the home page, Snake Of The Day.  If ever our web site is considered a popular resource for corn snake research I’ll perform the daunting task of classifying them by subject.  One way to gain access to specific subjects is to type a key word or phrase (like STRIPED BUTTER TESSERA) into the search field near the upper right-hand corner of our web site.  It will result in the listing of all SMR articles containing the respective search words you entered, just as you would see in the results of an Internet search on your browser.  Since there has been considerable chatter on the Internet lately regarding the distinction between Tessera and Striped Tessera, and Motley Tessera, you may find some of the information in this old SMR article from August 5, 2013 to be helpful?  

Snake of the Day 08-22-16

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This female 2015 Baja Mountain Kingsnake (Lampropeltis zonata agalma) is quickly growing and just as quickly changing from red bands to orange.  She and her 2015 mate-to-be are here on breeding loan from Stephen Gagliardo.  Thanks, Stephen, for the opportunity to breed this beautiful species.  

Snake of the Day 08-21-16

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As hatchlings, all of our red-modified Amel corns are rather boring in the color department.  This ONE is no exception but it will be something new in the realm of red albino corns (even beyond being a Fluorescent and beyond being a Cherry).  Our male Cherry corn is the father and the mother is the red Fluorescent, both of which we’ve shared pictures of for a couple of years now.  We may only sell two or three of these gems this year, but since there is no model adult for this genetic combination, the only promise we can make is that they will be remarkably red as adults.   PICs of her parents

Snake of the Day 08-20-16

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Hours old at the time of this photograph, the first 2016 SMR Cayenne Fire hatched on August 13th looks like a typical Fire (Amel Bloodred), but in a few short months that will change.  The orange gives way to bright red and even the white ground zones change to red, often rendering a virtually uni-colored red snake.   What distinguishes these from most Fire corns is the possession of a third gene mutation, Red Factor (RF).  Corns in this brood will be the only ones to hatch this year from pairing the South African Line male with John Finsterwald’s (https://coloradocorns.com) beautiful SMR Cayenne Fire here on breeding loan.  If you don’t buy any from me, you’d better contact John quickly before these run out.  Almost all of my half of these is already reserved, so few (if any) will be offered for sale at large on my web site.  Of course, like all of our red-modified corns, this one–and all of its siblings–the orange colors seen here will be extremely red at maturity.   

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The same snake in the above pic with a few of its siblings. 

Snake of the Day 08-19-16

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This is possibly the most atypical corn snake found in the vast U.S. range of its species? This BOOT Key Corn is surely why early scientists actually gave the nominate form of these insular corns (found on several of the Florida Keys south of the Florida mainland) a corn snake subspecies classification (formerly Elaphe guttata rosacea). Since then, because of “rafting” from Hurricanes and incidental migration of Key corns to the mainland and vice-versa, mainland corns finding their way to the keys as stow-aways in vehicles AND DNA testing revealing that they’re not distinct from their mainland counterparts, these are now classified as simply Corn Snakes. Whatever you think about what they are called, their natural coloration is so vastly different from corns found in most of their U.S. range that nobody can deny their beauty.