there are a couple who have claimed to have proven out super leopards that are not pieds. If that is the case then obviously not all leopards are het pied.

I haven't heard any new info or even seen picture of these animals (yes i do remember emailing the breeders making these claims and no response) but assuming this is true then leopard would be a simple dominant trait. Given how often leopards are actually het pied, it would be reasonable to assume that leopard and pied are closely linked.

my bad explaination would be, when baby snakes are getting their genes, strands of a chromosome are ripped at random spots and the baby gets some form mom and some from dad, if 2 genes are close to each other on a choromosome, they will more than likely get be on the same strand unless the random spot happen to be between the 2 genes and also one of the stands comes from mom and another comes from dad. closer the genes are together the less of a chance of separating them.