As long as we're talking belly scales...

[guguyni]

Hello again!

With all the belly scale talk, and with some of the pictures and information that's been posted about the bellies of other morphs, I've started to wonder about our third cornsnake, Artemis. I always thought she was a normal, but after looking at so many pictures yesterday trying to figure out Thor and Freya, I started to wonder if she might be something else (maybe a hypo?) instead. Thor has the black "blocks" on his belly, while a ghost has faded "blocks." Does this mean that a normal has black "blocks" as well?

I've attached shots of her belly; the lighter one was taken closer to her head, and the darker one nearer the tail (the washed out portion is just the flash making her look irridescent). I've also attached picture of her topside. (I would have gotten better shots, but I had her in one hand and the camera in the other...)

Is she a normal after all?

Thanks again!
Annie and Jacob.

 

[guguyni]

Oops! Forgot to attach the pictures!

Here they are!

 

[guguyni]

Here they are, take two...

Having brain farts here. Let's see if I did it right THIS time...

Annie

 

[Josua]

I think she is a hypomelanistic.

Normals, anery's caramels (and so on) have dark/black belly's,
Amels, butters, snows (and so on) have more orange/green belly's,
And hypos and ghost have 'less black' belly's, just like your Artemis.

 

[ChristinaM]

any possibility of her being het bloodred? That one belly pic, reminds me so much of my het bloods. Here's a couple belly shots of my normal het br, lavender, amel:

I'm not an expert on hypo's, but I'd lean towards Artemis being a normal het for ?????

 

[Weebonilass]

I would say that he is still a normal. My hypo has a creamy orange belly and no orange checkers and his black checkers are only about half as dark as Thor's.

 

[RavenSpirit360]

Hi My normal Miami phase has the checkers like your too.. At least I think he is a normal miami phase lol.. So I guess either mine is a hypo too or yours in a normal Your snake Artimis is a very pretty normal if it is a normal..
But also my hypo babies don't have creamy scales like the hypo in the pics either..

 

[Josua]

@ChristinaM:
normals het. bloodred indeed have differtent belly pattern.
But with them you wil usually see normal black checkers with a white line down the middel.
While with hypo's, all the belly checkers are lighter in color.

 

[diamondlil]

Here's my hypo, Buck, I'll try to get some better ventral shots soon, but he looks mighty similar to your snake to me

 

[Asvard]

ok then

why does my Amel have pink checks on her belly the as if she was a snow

 

[Josua]

why does my Amel have pink checks on her belly the as if she was a snow

That's because a snow is an amel.

Snow is amel X anery.
Anery doesn't do anything with the black pigment, but amel does. (amel = without black pigment).
The same is with butter (caramel + amel). The caramel has no effect on the black pigment, but the amel in a butter makes the belly looks pink-isch.

 

[ChristinaM]

@ChristinaM:
normals het. bloodred indeed have differtent belly pattern.
But with them you wil usually see normal black checkers with a white line down the middel.
While with hypo's, all the belly checkers are lighter in color.

Most of my het bloods have the peppered look ( as shown in my pics) as opposed to a white line down the middle. Unfortunately the only hypo pic I have is of my motley, so it's not really a fair comparission considerring she has no checks Whereas these pics are indeed similiar to what the poster posted, hence bringing up if there's a chance the snake is het blood

 

[SPJ]

Here's a shot. I really like this one's pattern.

 

[Susan]

Belly checks can vary a great deal in normals....from heavy black checkering

To a few scattered checks

To faint checks

Hypos can also have a variety of belly checks...

 

[RavenSpirit360]

Here is a pic of my normals belly checks.. He is supposedly a Miami normal.. His checks look alot like yours. I looked at my yearling hypo today and realised she has fainter black checks. They look almost like shes getting ready to shed but shes not. So I guess I can see the difference in hers and her dads belly pattern. I like this thread its very interesting

 

[SnakeAround]

I think the snake migh tbe hypo, though my miami phase has the same belly checkers so lighter ones are not only related to hypo indeed... yours is pretty light colored that is why I think hypo, the lighter checkers add to the idea...

 

[guguyni]

Thanks for all the input once again. It looks like this one's not quite so clear-cut, though, eh? It looks like there's a decent chance she might be a hypo, but I'm thinking that the only way to know for sure is to breed her to something of known parentage and see what the snakeling look like...

She really is a great snake. Having been a snake-lover all my life, I really shocked my eight-year-old son when he asked for a corn snake for his birthday and I got her for him. Letting you kid have a snake make you one of the "cool moms," and it was a great excuse to get back into snake-keeping again after all these years...

Thanks again.
Annie

 

[sarah s]

No idea but my amel Rainoo has both pink and green checks on her belly and I doubt very much she is anything other than an amel maybe a amel hypo at most. Her checks are also very few and far between as well. Once she's out of blue and I have the camera working I will post up some good belly shots for you to see.