What does this look like?

[PythonWallace]

If he's healthy and feeding, $30 is a great deal for any ball python, IMO...

I agree. He's big and eats like a monster, so I have no complaints.

And I know who it is...

A lot of people know. I posted the name last week. These are just the follow up pictures.

Dude, This is what its all about! Breed that male to a few girls. That gives you 3-4 years of Hoping its something! I'm not saying it is something. But Imagine if it proves? Thats Golden.. Thats 3-4 years that kept you Happy and excited about YOUR animal! And Ball Pythons... If it proves to be normal? Thats still a plus! It kept YOU in the hobbie for 3-4 more years With a GOAL! WIN WIN in My book! NOW JUST DO IT!

That's what I think. I don't understand some of the gripes people have about having a normal male. While I believe the guy that he is a het for some simple recessive, everyone should have dinker projects. Let's get the number of proven genetic base morphs up there. While I'd rather it be a female to mess around with, The one I liked was a male (still talking about snakes here). It gives me something to look forward to for years to come. If it proves out to be just a nice normal, I'll still have my morphs and plenty of combos and other projects hatching out by then. No worries, they can't all be winners.

Seems fun enough.. who knows, you might get some orange ghosts or albinos or something crazy. If you feel like it, I'd breed him to a normal female, and then holdback his daughters and breed him to them. Who knows?
But as for knowing what it looks like; hets for snakes like ghosts, albinos, etc. look normal. So appearances really aren't important unless you were trying to prove out his traits (he seems pretty "chrome-y" with little yellow) then appearances don't matter in that department.
I think that you're at least going into it with the right attidude; if he is simply a normal and you get normies out of him, you don't mind, and that's cool.

I know he's not het albino or OG. He gave me that much, because I already have an albino project, and there was no way I was buying it to find out in 3 years I bought another het albino male. The male OG hets were right next to these guys on the table being sold as such, and the seller made it sound like hets for whatever he was claiming mine was were pricier than his OG het males. I know hets for recessives don't have any visable signs, except for the poss. het pied markers. With the pics I was basically asking if it looked normal, showed het pied markers (I still don't see what people are talking about when they post pics of pied markers), or if it looked like some dominant trait that I might not be familiar with yet. A lot of these new dominant traits are really subtle, like the spectors, so I was looking for opinions. I'm sure if it was a dominant trait it would have been sold and priced as such, but it doesn't hurt to ask for other opinions when there are so many subtle new morphs.

[Nagini88]

yeah, that was my thought, but I cant say for sure untill I breed her 2+ years down the road XD I'll probably do it when I get a pied. if she turns out normal, I'll atleast have 100% het pied babies XD

[PythonWallace]

most people that sell snakes that are poss hets as normals. are selling them because they are 33% pos pos het for god knows what. the odds are you are going to gain nothing but breeding training out of this. wich is good but i bet dollors to mole hills( i think that is how that saying goes) you will end up in the end with a ton of normal snakes. i for one would not waste my time. but if you are in it for the pure joy of proving out a pos pos morph go for it. keep us posted through the next 7 years. LOL if i am coming off mean i relly dont want to. i just hate to see a person with there hopes in the clouds with a project that most of us would not reccomend. you best bet is to go at least buy a 1.1 of what ever morph you have your heart set on. most people will even give a free het male with the buy of a het female.

I don't think you're coming off as mean, I just want to make sure you understand why I'm adding an unknown poss. normal male to my collection at this point. I basically bought him as a guaranteed 100% het without paperwork from a guy I trust enoughy to think it is worth the gamble. Het for what, I don't know, and that seems kind of stupid, but this snake stood out to me enough to enquire even before I was told that he was a het. Honestly, I'm kind of stoked to have an unkown project like this that will take years to prove one way or the other. If he passes anything about his pattern down to offspring, I'd be happy to breed him to a female co-dom in a couple of years to try for cleaner looking morphs. If he proves out to be a het for a recessive morph when he's bred back to his daughters I'd be happy. If he proves to be a normal, than I guess I get to entertain my gambling vice for 3 or more years for $30 and some rats. I didn't buy him thinking I'm going to hatch out my first morphs for cheap. I've spent about $7,000 on snakes in the last 12 months, and by the time this guy proves one way or the other, I could be hatching out 3-4 way combos. I'm doing it just to see what happens.

[Ginevive]

There's nothing wrong at all with having normal males. I myself have that striped male. If he proves to be genetic or not, it does not really matter to me in terms of keeping him. I chose him as a cool-looking, must-have snake first. Anything genetic about him would be a huge bonus, but not something I am counting on of course. I think that, your similar attitude about your male, is the right mind set

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I was thinking fire until I saw his belly.

How should a fire belly be?

[PythonWallace]

How should a fire belly be?

From the one's I've seen they have all white bellies with no black markings below the saddles.

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Thanks