Identification Guide

So, I've been looking through a lot of sellers ads and looking at snakes. What would you veterans say would be the best way to verify a snakes morph? Some are fairly easy to determine like the recessive morphs. But for instance if someone mentions their snake is an Enchi pastel. Well Pastels are relative easy to ID but for a novice like me what do you look for to see if it's an Enchi? Is there a document somewhere that says "For ____ Morph you look for more yellow on the side of the snake" or "The head will have ____ pattern if it's a _____ Morph.". I know most of the ways you ID a snake is just by practice, but are there guidelines for certain morphs and some place that lists these guidelines for someone like me to reference? I've been staring at sites like the world of ball pythons big morph list and while most of the morphs will have a picture, some of them look the same as others to me. I'm guessing it's because I don't know exactly what to look for.

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Originally Posted by Madscrills

So, I've been looking through a lot of sellers ads and looking at snakes. What would you veterans say would be the best way to verify a snakes morph? Some are fairly easy to determine like the recessive morphs. But for instance if someone mentions their snake is an Enchi pastel. Well Pastels are relative easy to ID but for a novice like me what do you look for to see if it's an Enchi? Is there a document somewhere that says "For ____ Morph you look for more yellow on the side of the snake" or "The head will have ____ pattern if it's a _____ Morph.". I know most of the ways you ID a snake is just by practice, but are there guidelines for certain morphs and some place that lists these guidelines for someone like me to reference? I've been staring at sites like the world of ball pythons big morph list and while most of the morphs will have a picture, some of them look the same as others to me. I'm guessing it's because I don't know exactly what to look for.

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Such a thing would make this hobby much simpler, wouldn't it? Unfortunately, it doesn't really exist because of the variability within each morph. Yes, there are traits to look for that exemplify each morph, but you can't say that 100% of the time this morph will exhibit this trait - especially when you start combining morphs into combos.

WOBP is a good place online to start getting a feel for what these traits are. Kevin McCurley's book is a great resource as well. Having said that, experience is the best teacher - the more examples of quality animals you see, the better you'll get at playing the "what's in there before I read what's in there" game.

could you help me ID this boy? that would be awesome.

https://fbcdn-sphotos-h-a.akamaihd.n...45f12f74bd7234

Looks like a lesser ghost to me @liebremarsano but I could be wrong

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Originally Posted by Sammiebob

Looks like a lesser ghost to me @liebremarsano but I could be wrong

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yeah im acutally trying to decide if its either a lesser or lesser ghost! very confusing to me ! :S

By the way, this is not the thread to ask. You have already created two or three threads asking about it, the only way to tell for sure is breed it to a ghost/hypo and see how the babies look

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Originally Posted by Sammiebob

By the way, this is not the thread to ask. You have already created two or three threads asking about it, the only way to tell for sure is breed it to a ghost/hypo and see how the babies look

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ma bad

Well sadly a written guide does not mean much, remember a picture is worth a thousand words. To me the more of a mutations you see (pictures and in person which is even better) the better you will get at spotting morphs that my be a little more subtle then others.

There is really no guideline because each morph can vary greatly.

I wish there was a periodic table of morphs. just like the element table except with gene count, odds of hitting, what it takes to make!

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Originally Posted by carbn8

I wish there was a periodic table of morphs. just like the element table except with gene count, odds of hitting, what it takes to make!

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Prepare to have your mind blown... :O

• OWALReptiles Calculator: http://www.owalreptiles.com/genetics.php
• WOBP Genetic Wizard: http://www.worldofballpythons.com/wizard/