As far as I can tell, ringers are just odd balls. Pun definitely intended.
Ringers have nothing to do with het pieds, although a lot of het or supposed het pieds have them.
Truthfully, I bet if you did an in-depth study, you'd find more non het pied ringers than het pied ringers. People for some reason tend to claim the ringer as an indicator of a het pied, but it's not always.
Yellow ringers and white ringers are the same thing, the color change is based on the snake's body color.
The fastest way to tell a low white pied from a ringer is the pattern. A ringer has the standard alien-head pattern of a normal ball, with a patch of white usually rimmed in orange of various sizes.
A true low white pied may carry what appears to be a ringer, but the body pattern is all wrong. The pied gene shatters the standard pattern into streaks, splotches and squiggles that may or may not contain something vaguely resembling an alien head.
I'm posting a pic of my own low white pied, so you can see what I mean. While his only "pied" marking could easily be a ringer spot, you can tell by his pattern he's pied.
Gale
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