SMR Archive

The Snake-of-the-Day headliner of this web site features photographs that we believe will interest our web site visitors.  Each daily photograph will be posted at 11:00 am. central (GMT – 5) and replaced in 24 hours. Feel free to make suggestions regarding what snake photographs you would like to see in this daily feature.   The animals pictured here are not for sale, unless otherwise noted, but you can find available surplus snakes for sale on the Surplus Page of this web site.  We appreciate your patronage and welcome any suggestions you may have.

    

This 2011 adult Caramel Tessera has an amazing concentration of ventro–lateral carotenoid yellow, and typically continually exhibits more of it through maturity. Retaining carotenes is not at all uncommon in corn snakes, but this is the most and fastest accumulation I’ve seen.  With this much yellow at only two years of age, I suspect this snake will have an amazing volume of yellow in just two or three more years.  I’ll share carotenoid retention progress on this snake as it matures. 

The Snake-of-the-Day headliner of this web site features photographs that we believe will interest our web site visitors.  Each daily photograph will be posted at 11:00 am. central (GMT – 5) and replaced in 24 hours. Feel free to make suggestions regarding what snake photographs you would like to see in this daily feature.   The animals pictured here are not for sale, unless otherwise noted, but you can find available surplus snakes for sale on the Surplus Page of this web site.  We appreciate your patronage and welcome any suggestions you may have.

    

The left image shows three Kastanie mutants, two of which are from the U.S. line discoverd in Florida Key Corns.  The far-right head in that image belongs to a Kastanie whose parents were both from the German line started by Frank Schaub.  Typical of SMR German Kastanies, when mature, this hatchling will have a redder head than the U.S. Kastanies.  The German lineage Kastanies I have will display generally darker colors at maturity, while the U.S. Kastanies tend to display a brighter orange overtone.  Many Kastanies resemble neonatal Anery mutants when they first hatch, quickly putting on color in the first months of maturity.  The adult Kastanie on the right is the mother of the hatchling German Kastanie pictured on the left. 

The Snake-of-the-Day headliner of this web site features photographs that we believe will interest our web site visitors.  Each daily photograph will be posted at 11:00 am. central (GMT – 5) and replaced in 24 hours. Feel free to make suggestions regarding what snake photographs you would like to see in this daily feature.   The animals pictured here are not for sale, unless otherwise noted, but you can find available surplus snakes for sale on the Surplus Page of this web site.  We appreciate your patronage and welcome any suggestions you may have.

    

Certainly not all the different color and pattern combinations in the Tessera mutant complex, but these are representatives of all the ones we’ve produced so far this year.  Noted models for these pix include, though some were camera shy:  Regular Tessera, Amel, Anery, Caramel, Charcoal, Bloodred, Lava, Buf, Butter, Striped Butter, Striped Ghost, Striped Caramel, and a couple of odd Striped Tesseras.  After noting that the Striped Butter Tessera was buried, and due to the stress (MINE, not theirs) of setting up, maintaining order, and breaking down this shoot, I elected not to shoot again just so the Striped Butter Tessera would be visible.  Doing it all over again, surely one of the others would take his place under the substrate?  I NEVER want to do a busy shoot like this again.  Whewwww!

The Snake-of-the-Day headliner of this web site features photographs that we believe will interest our web site visitors.  Each daily photograph will be posted at 11:00 am. central (GMT – 5) and replaced in 24 hours. Feel free to make suggestions regarding what snake photographs you would like to see in this daily feature.   The animals pictured here are not for sale, unless otherwise noted, but you can find available surplus snakes for sale on the Surplus Page of this web site.  We appreciate your patronage and welcome any suggestions you may have.

  

From pairing a Striped Tessera to a Sunkissed Motley, six or seven of the progeny look like this one.  In some light exposures, the heads appear to be baby-blue.  Of all of them, this one has the most dramatic Hurricane variation of the Motley pattern.    

The Snake-of-the-Day headliner of this web site features photographs that we believe will interest our web site visitors.  Each daily photograph will be posted at 11:00 am. central (GMT – 5) and replaced in 24 hours. Feel free to make suggestions regarding what snake photographs you would like to see in this daily feature.   The animals pictured here are not for sale, unless otherwise noted, but you can find available surplus snakes for sale on the Surplus Page of this web site.  We appreciate your patronage and welcome any suggestions you may have.

  

(LEFT) Yet ANOTHER boring shot of a Tessera family?  At first glance, “yes”, but these Tesseras should mature to have lots of black and intensely maroon markings.  The common corn in the upper-right-hand corner of the left image has beautifully shaped lateral markings with deeply maroon centers.  Ghosty-looking?  (RIGHT) A high-black Tessera that was sired by the same male as the hatchlings on the left.  BTW, I love the fish skeleton look on the tail that falsely appears to be the spine and ribs showing through the break of the red dorsal stripe.  

The Snake-of-the-Day headliner of this web site features photographs that we believe will interest our web site visitors.  Each daily photograph will be posted at 11:00 am. central (GMT – 5) and replaced in 24 hours. Feel free to make suggestions regarding what snake photographs you would like to see in this daily feature.   The animals pictured here are not for sale, unless otherwise noted, but you can find available surplus snakes for sale on the Surplus Page of this web site.  We appreciate your patronage and welcome any suggestions you may have.

 

Part of a brood including Ultramel Charcoals.  Blizzard is the composite product of Amel & Charcoal, but the Ulta & Charcoal counterpart composite is the Ultramel Charcoal (non-Amels in this picture). Most of our adult Blizzards are actually Snow Blizzards so we often get Anery and Snow products along with the Charcoals and Blizzards.  See the South Mountain Reptiles FaceBook image from two DAYs ago to see more of the siblingss of this brood. 

The Snake-of-the-Day headliner of this web site features photographs that we believe will interest our web site visitors.  Each daily photograph will be posted at 11:00 am. central (GMT – 5) and replaced in 24 hours. Feel free to make suggestions regarding what snake photographs you would like to see in this daily feature.   The animals pictured here are not for sale, unless otherwise noted, but you can find available surplus snakes for sale on the Surplus Page of this web site.  We appreciate your patronage and welcome any suggestions you may have.

 

First Yawn??  Perhaps, but more likely the only way to satisfy an itch (in the absence of limbs) when separating epidermal generations tickle?  Just a family of Snow corns hangin out together, waiting for their first shed. At right, arguably the least colored & patterned corn snake morph, the Whiteouts (Bloodred Blizzards) on the right are the whitest corns there are (other than Palmettos, that is).  Naturally, these are pink now, but most of our adult Whiteouts are virtually pure white with no carotenoid yellow on them.  The gold flakes on these snakes is from the vermiculite hatch medium.

The Snake-of-the-Day headliner of this web site features photographs that we believe will interest our web site visitors.  Each daily photograph will be posted at 11:00 am. central (GMT – 5) and replaced in 24 hours. Feel free to make suggestions regarding what snake photographs you would like to see in this daily feature.   The animals pictured here are not for sale, unless otherwise noted, but you can find available surplus snakes for sale on the Surplus Page of this web site.  We appreciate your patronage and welcome any suggestions you may have.

 

Not all, but many of the exceptional Okeetee variants begin as the color-opposite of their beautiful mature counterparts; lackluster.  The dark snake in the left-hand image is a Buckskin Okeetee.  His markings barely (if at all) exhibit the rich mahogany colors they’ll display at maturity.  Some equally beautiful Okeetee Variants exhibit colored markings as soon as they hatch, so don’t gage the potential of either neonatal look.  The Buckskin Okeetee has no relationship to the Creamsicle Bloodred.  I just wanted contrast in the picture since I chose such a dark substratum.  But while I’m here, I may as well show a more orange sibling of that Creamsicle Okeetee.   

The Snake-of-the-Day headliner of this web site features photographs that we believe will interest our web site visitors.  Each daily photograph will be posted at 11:00 am. central (GMT – 5) and replaced in 24 hours. Feel free to make suggestions regarding what snake photographs you would like to see in this daily feature.   The animals pictured here are not for sale, unless otherwise noted, but you can find available surplus snakes for sale on the Surplus Page of this web site.  We appreciate your patronage and welcome any suggestions you may have.

 

This is one of the ?Striped Sunkissed? corns we showed you when it was right out of the egg.  After its first shed, it’s easier to see the two different color zones that are separated by the dorso-lateral stripes.  In a couple of years may find out if it’s a new corn snake mutant.  

The Snake-of-the-Day headliner of this web site features photographs that we believe will interest our web site visitors.  Each daily photograph will be posted at 11:00 am. central (GMT – 5) and replaced in 24 hours. Feel free to make suggestions regarding what snake photographs you would like to see in this daily feature.   The animals pictured here are not for sale, unless otherwise noted, but you can find available surplus snakes for sale on the Surplus Page of this web site.  We appreciate your patronage and welcome any suggestions you may have.

 

Both images show the same Scaleless Hypo Sunkissed corn snake that has just begun the physical separation phase of shedding its old epidermis.  Relative to the epidermis of a typical snake, it’s obvious that Scaleless mutant corns have a much thinner and more delicate outer skin.  As MARGARET NALL pointed out on the Scaleless feature of SMR’s FaceBook page toDAY (thank you, Margaret), their sloughed skin is identical in appearance and texture to that of most geckos. Of course, the obvious distinction between the two species is the mostly smooth and feature-less skin of the snake, compared to the bumpy skin topography of many gecko species. Usually, when starting the skin separation process by rubbing their mouth against something stationary, partial or complete failure results, leaving other weaker parts of the skin to tear first.  Therefore, I like to put a hide of damp sphagnum moss in the cage when I see that they are about to shed.  You can also see that the color of the new skin generation beneath the separating dead epidermis barely differs in color intensity compared to the more obvious distinction between old and new epidermal generations in fully-scaled corns.  Amazing how the SCALE facet of the integumentary system (outer skin) in fully-scaled corn snakes appears to partially conceal the color intensity residing in lower dermal levels.