A big statement about CAMARILLO/CARAMEL/ULTRAMEL/CRIDER BALLS

At the time that I purchased my Ultramel from Eric Crider over a year ago, he had not yet determined if the Ultramels were the same (and therefore compatible with) the Crider Caramels which bear his name. Criders are different from the standard caramels (and not compatible). Ultramels were more recently brought in from Africa and the last I'd heard is that compatibility with the Criders had not yet been determined. I've seen similarly aged Ultramels and Caramels side by side and they are clearly different. I have not seen a Crider in person, however, so I cannot speak on how they compared with Ultramels and Caramels in appearance.

Thanks for the clarification, Maki! I was under the impression that Ultramel and Crider had been proven compatible, but I guess I jumped the gun.

Nice to read sth that makes me the topic clear. I am impressed about the Ultra stuff!

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Originally Posted by ace_singapore

This fits my thoughts ;) So depending on that nowadays it is hard to obtain "Ultramel/Crider" balls and price is higher then "normal" caramels?

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But don't let the names fool you into paying extra... I buy my BP based on it's fancy color and pattern, not fancy names.[/QUOTE]

It's not the name your paying for, it's the morph. At this point, it's believed that ultramel/criders do NOT kink like most caramels do. That's one of the reasons they cost a pretty penny.

It is really not that complicated other than some keepers want others to think it is. It all starts back in the early 90s (before most had internet and had to use snail mail).

Ernie wagner had a ball python that he called the "Caramel ball" Later as more imports came in (VPI,NERD,Bell) that sounded like they looked similar to Ernie wagners snake all of them became known as Caramel balls. The snake Ernie Wagner had died before it could be bred back to any of its het daughters so some hets were sent to Mark Bell to breed to his male Caramel. Well needless to say none of the hets proved out bred to the Bells Caramel and so the morph Ernie Wagner had almost disapeared into ball python history as it was assumed to be nothing since it was not compatible. Some of those hets are what founded Criders line as well as Vin Russos line. The catch was Vin Russos male het Caramel was also het for the "other morph from Ernie Wagner" Vin bred the male to normal females and raised all the possible hets only he did not realise he was raising possible double hets. So when he started making Caramels funny things were poping out like What is now called Crider balls as well as the 1 in 16 Camarillo.

Vin Russo Has what is now called Crider balls and Mark Bell line normal Caramels. He Also made the Combo of the two morph the Camarillo. Thats it nothing crazy.

Crider balls have not been proven to be the same morph as Ultramels but I have some of each and they look like the same morh to me.

Ryan Young

Ryan - it is the best post I think I have read ;) Now everything is clear and understand ;)

Is it possible that you could show some pics of Criders and Ultramels? I am especially interested in their eyes.

i just got my first caramel albino and it is perfect. i want some advice on what i should be looking to breed it with to avoid kinking down the line. one thing for instance i would like to know is should i go caramel to caramel or are hets safe to go with? i am looking to create some funky caramel morphs and put a new twist on some that are already out there. any ideas would be appreciated. thanks this is my first time posting so if i did anything wrong please bear with me. i am a fan of ball pythons and i got about 10 different morphs and this seems like a good place to learn.

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Originally Posted by einster

i just got my first caramel albino and it is perfect. i want some advice on what i should be looking to breed it with to avoid kinking down the line. one thing for instance i would like to know is should i go caramel to caramel or are hets safe to go with? i am looking to create some funky caramel morphs and put a new twist on some that are already out there. any ideas would be appreciated. thanks this is my first time posting so if i did anything wrong please bear with me. i am a fan of ball pythons and i got about 10 different morphs and this seems like a good place to learn.

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I am planning to avoid caramel x caramel -- not because of the kinking potential (in theory, that shouldn't make a difference; I've also read plenty of accounts of kinks from het x het or het x visual). I'm planning of avoid it because of these threads:

http://ball-pythons.net/forums/showt...-on-Eggs-Photo

http://www.reptileradio.net/reptiler...ad.php?t=20146

... Now, these don't definitively prove that caramel females are sub-fertile, but it's enough to make me want to use mostly caramel males and het females for my projects. (I'm getting into caramels now as well ...) That's just personal opinion, though -- you may read something totally different out of those threads, or feel that the sample size is too small, etc., etc.. It is a fairly small sample size to draw definitive conclusions.

I, too, am hoping to make some neat caramel combos, and my plan so far is to buy a caramel male this year (already paid for; waiting on the weather :( ), breed him to some morphs this season to make female hets, raise them up for a year, then buy an unrelated 2nd caramel male (hatchling) in 2013 or 2014 to breed to the het females. That's just my plan, though -- I think there are quite a few ways to do it.

My original plan was to buy a caramel pair this year and hold back male hets to breed to the female. I changed that though when it started to seem to me as though the females' fertility may be less than stellar ... I'm not saying that you shouldn't buy female caramels. I just wanted to hedge my bets.

As far as avoiding kinks, I'm not sure how to do that 100% -- I don't know if it's even possible. :( "Rumor" has it that some lines kink more than others, and some breeders *claim* to have produced few to no kinks. With that in mind, I looked for a baby from a clutch with no kinks, and a track record of few kinks in the line. I'm still prepared for the possibility of kinked babies, though. (Not looking forward to it, but prepared for it.)