Total Albino Confusion

[Adam_Wysocki]

Okay my eyes are crossed, my dishes aren't done and I'm seriously considering giving up on BP morph research and just buying myself a nice fat obnoxious toy poodle and retiring to my porch swing to sip vodka!!!

Grey goose I hope ... come on over, I have a bottle in the freezer!

What confuses me is a carmel albino also called a carmel or are they different morphs altogether?

Same thing ... "caramel" is just short for caramel albino.

If a carmel albino is some sort of albino can it be mated to a "regular" albino.

Sure, you can breed anything to anything. But as of right now, they are two distinct and separate morphs, so breeding them together will produce normal looking snakes that carry the genes for both.

What the heck is T- T+ (best I could figure out in my currently confuddled state is it's some sort of genetic that does or doesn't produce a dark coloring).

The T+ and T- refer to two different types of albinism. The "T" is short for "tyrosinase" which is an enzyme responsible for the production of melanin and other pigments. Traditional albinos are said to be "T -" or tyrosinase negative (lacking the enzyme tyrosinase) which prevents the animal from producing it's natural coloration. Caramels are a different form of albinism where tyrosinase is believed to be preset (hence the tyrosinase positive or "T+" label), but functioning differently from normal appearing animals. All that said, I don't believe that any ball python has ever been tested for the presence of (or lack of) tyrosinase so it's all really just speculation. But it works for me!

Here's a picture of a T- next to a T+ ....



-adam