patternless prairie rattler

[Scales Zoo]

Scales Zoo does a little independent research at the densites near our house. Last year we found a patternless rattler during the spring count, there are some pictures of him in our photo gallery. We also spotted a hypomelanistic bullsnake, too quick to get a good picture of it. We were wondering if there are any other field herpers out there who have noticed any patternless rattlers, and if you have any pictures to share. We are looking forward to seeing this snake again this year, we missed seeing it in the fall, but that does not mean it was not at the den.

[BWSmith]

Truly a nice find. I am always looking out for odd NATURAL color and pattern variations such as my stiped copperhead.

[Hamster of Borg]

http://www.ravnos.org/photos/z-venomous/patternless_atrox17.jpg

Patternless atrox, and her baby, born to a breeder last year.

Ham

[JD@reptiles]

Awsome. do you breed hots hamster?

[Hamster of Borg]

Haven't thus far, but I do have pairs of a few species. I don't have much interest in atrox though, too high strung for me. :)

Ham

[JasonBrennan]

Did I hear striped copper head?? Would like to see that one.

[Matt]

hey BW, are you breeding that striped copper this year?

[BWSmith]

Yup, he is in with a little girl right now.

Here he is (http://www.ssnakess.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=11469)

[Matt]

are you interested in selling the offspring....cause i am EXTREAMLY interested if you are!
let me know :D

[BWSmith]

First Ihave to see if it is a Genetic stripe or induced during develoment by external factors.should be pretty obvious the second offspring are born. Luckily the striper is a male so he is being placed with several females.

[JasonBrennan]

Thanks for the link to the pic. Very cool copper! I would be interested in seeing the babies if they turn out similar!! Keep us posted, please!

[Scales Zoo]

Nice patternless atrox, any idea if it was a w/c, and if all the babies were of the patternless variety? We will be looking for the patternless prairie rattler by April 21, they are usually out by then. Hopefully it is a trait that is being passed on in this population, and we will be finding young patternless soon.

The striped copperhead is indeed a splendid creature, please share the results of the breeding with us, as we are very interested to see the offspring. We do not keep or breed any of the venomous snakes, but we admire them in other's collections.
We do look forward to our project of striped boas, hopefully it is genetic, and not just the results of environmental influences.

[Hamster of Borg]

She was wild caught in central Texas, as a baby. Out of an initial captive breeding, hets were born - normal colorations. One of the male hets was bred back to the original patternless. Roughly half the litter was patternless, all female. It is believed at this point that this particular trait in C. atrox is only dominant in females. Another het to het breeding was done, resulting in a single patternless offspring - female as well. To my knowledge these were the only successful attempts to captive breed patternless atrox. There have been at least three different wild caught patternless that I've become aware of, all female.

Ham

[Scales Zoo]

Interesting info on the patternless trait being dominant in females. We do not sex any of the rattlers we encounter, just photos. If we were to pursue more data, we would possibly weigh the snakes, sex them, and release them again. Due to the protected status, we are limited to hands-off research for now.

Hopefully we will have pictures to post in a few weeks

Sheila and Ryan