my male tiger might be calico

i was shedding my 14' male tiger retic , and i saw something weird ,like a couple scales were missing and it looked like he had a couple of large scars on his dorsel strip,,, and i took a closer look and they were almost pure white and yelowish gray scales,, he has always been a very dark almost black snake,,,, but this is just weird,,,,ill have a couple of pics up in a min..... tell me what yall think

https://ball-pythons.net/gallery/fil...003_531408.jpg

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there the white patches in and on the dorsle stripe

and you can see some scales that are half white and half his normal dorsle color which is normaly just tan

Do the scales have a different feeling to them than the other scales?

nope, thats what i thought, i thought that it was a scare but they feel just like the others and you can see the white blinding in with the other colors

and he has no scares, and he also eats frozen rabbits

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Originally Posted by playingwithsnake_21

nope, thats what i thought, i thought that it was a scare but they feel just like the others and you can see the white blinding in with the other colors

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Hmm that's odd, I do hear that snakes (and especially morphs) will go through color changes. I saw a video on YouTube with Prehistoric Pets and he produced some solid white hatchling Retics that will go through a color change and start to get patterns and colors.

well idk but heres a few more pics

https://ball-pythons.net/gallery/fil...3/sany0006.jpg


https://ball-pythons.net/gallery/fil...004_189744.jpg

he had some shed left on his head ,because i let him do that his self well he is pilling it off his self right now and i heard a loud hiss like something was missing with him and i went and looked and he had most of it off but i noticed on the side of his face was a big and i mean BIG spot of what i believe is calico white like every thing else ill see if i can get him to sit still for a min to get a pic

https://ball-pythons.net/gallery/fil...3/sany0012.jpg

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sorry he would not sit still,,, and tell me what you guys think i need to know, cause im clueless

not sure I would say thats a calico man it looks like something is wrong with the scales like they are dried out or an infection or something

no man there fine i email N.E.R.D. the pics Kevin said that i might be right, but i wont know untell a few more sheds.

and on top of that i take real good care in my snakes,i have had this guy since he was a mean little guy back in 2003,, this guys has the poss to be he is a wild caught snake. but every thing is fine with him there no different feel to those white scales ,than any other scale on his body

I didnt say you didnt take care of your snakes. I just stated I didnt think it was a calico.

a no its cool,, i dont know what its is all i know is that its not hurting him and hes fine,,,, but come on what would you think if one of your burms are perfectly healthy and one day its sheds and there are scales that are dang near pure white ,,, hes fine and its not in just one spot on his body,,, kind odd,, but yeah man no hard feelings ,,,, if hes not cool with me but if he is well heck i got one heck of a cool snake...,,, but yeah its kool

if it was one of my burms and he shed and had a mark like that on his head we would be at the vets office now. I have to much invested in my burms to take a chance wondering what something is. He may turn out to be calico. Who produced him? How long have you had him? How old is he? Im sure you take really good care of your snakes but I take good care of mine to and one of my burms got a horrible infection about a year ago and really messed him up. So sometimes things happen. I would separate him from my other snakes until I was sure what was going on.

I have seen this type of discoloration before and it was from some stuck shed that waqsnt noticed but came off with the next shed cleared up after the following two sheds and went back to normal color. maybe you'll be lucky and it will end up being a calico, but it seems kind of on the older side of anything I have heard of going through the change.

ok man dang, and he is 6 years old, was wild caught, went to the vet this morning, that how i know hes fine, he's 14' feet in length, has no mite or parasites, has plenty of water humidity, and i probably have just a much invested in my retics, as you do in your burms.. man im not trying to fight, dang i have said throw out this post that there is nothing wrong with him, and like i said befor i could care less if he was i just wanted some input on this and nothing else the whole there is nothing wrong with him has lond done past on the other page,,, so come on man, there scales that are white the are just like the other scales on his whole body, but there white and some are half white and half his regular color.

Maybe you are misunderstanding my posts or something. Im not trying to argue with you or anything you asked for others input and I just gave you mine. Im not trying to fight just trying to help answer your questions. Glad to see he got taken to a vet and checked out.

i soak and shed the snake my self so i don't have a big miss in the cage ,, im kind of a clean freak...the only reason i didn't get his head this time is because he is in one hell of a breeding mood and is a little nippy this time of year.

no its cool man im just leting every buddy know that every thing is ok with him thats why its weird for me to see all the white on his face and dorsal ,,, but yeah i get what you saying it just seemed like i had p you off a little or something, sorry if i had!

ill see if i cant get clearer pics

and the shed that you all see will be coming off after this is posted

https://ball-pythons.net/gallery/fil...3/sany0014.jpg


https://ball-pythons.net/gallery/fil...3/sany0013.jpg

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Originally Posted by playingwithsnake_21

no its cool man im just leting every buddy know that every thing is ok with him thats why its weird for me to see all the white on his face and dorsal ,,, but yeah i get what you saying it just seemed like i had p you off a little or something, sorry if i had!

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no man its all good

idk its looks crazy in person but the pics just make it so nasty looking ,,,, i dont know , the spot on his head looks kinda ugly but the the rest on him just looks cool as heck

dang that was a hassle, man it was hell trying to get that last bit of shed off of him,,,woo

still looking for input on this hes no sick or any thing hasnt had stuck shed and does not have a calcium defect,,,, and there not burns,,, any buddy have any thing else that might be up with him of has had experience with this just let me know

I have heard of snakes getting bad feeders and then shedding out parts of their coloration. I have also heard of snakes developing fungal or bacterial growth under the skin and it caused the snake to lose color. i would have your vet take an actual sample and TEST for some kind of microbe or something. Just looking him over would not be enough, you would need tests. As for the snake possibly being calico, it doesn't look like a random and clear enough distribution of white. Calico retics do develop their white over time, but you would think it would be in more random places than just those few. Especially with how round the patch is on the head, it looks like exactly what a skin ailment would do, it would start at one point and radiate outwards in a circle. You can see how at the edges, some of the scales are half white, half brown, and witch calico scales, the whole scale is usually white, but half and half. That is the main thing that makes it look not-at-all calico. I have seen a whole lot of calico snakes and something just doesn't look right about the patches on yours, especially that round one. It looks really suspicious. I would definitely not go calling it a calico just yet. It literally looks like the white just started radiating outward from the center and like it may possibly continue to do so. It looks scary! I would have tests run to try and find the cause of the problem, you can't possibly know if he's actually sick or something without testing for it. good luck!

let us know what it looks like after a couple sheds . I will lay odds that it is only due to pieces of old shed. my tiger and my java have done this before.

well guys i just got back from the vet once again , i have been there since like 4 or 5 he said that the spot on the face is from a rub while in shed and caused it to be irritated but the rest is random spotting he said which can be a genetic uniformity not calico, but he gave me some repti wound healing aid for the face rub,,, but the rest isnt calico and isnt any thing bad, its just random spotting he said wild caught snake are seen doing this

sorry for those who try to help and i would not let them,,,, thank you and this thank you is to all of you who had posted in this thread..

thank you guys again (solved)

no need for sorry. sometimes we get excited over things we are not sure of but really want to be true and it is hard to listen to people sometimes. End result, now you know what it is and your snake is ok and that is what really matters.