Settling in

So we have been in North Carolina for a month and a half now, and have finally settled in to a point where I feel comfortable. 

And apparently, even with all the changes, so is the rest of the family.

We never had stairs before like this, so we had a few days of trepidation with the pups.

Someone really really likes to be king of the stairs.

Also, moving in everything was a complete pain, and took a ridiculous amount of time.

Moving snakes across the country is NOT EASY. It is a blessing to have great friends that helped me out when I needed it, and I am now completely set up (with the exception of a few nick-knacks and decorations).

And of course, finding new places to find rodents, the room setup and wiring all took time to do. But I really actually feel comfortable now, which is really relieving!

After moving and settling in, of course, things started getting back to normal, and I really didn't expect to have another clutch at all.

BUT... of course I did.

I wasn't paying attention at all to this gal, and saw her on eggs while I was watering.

This female was a breeding project that I intended to do last year (and did, but got no eggs), and put her in with the Mojave Pied to see if he was a Het Albino. I put him in a few months before we moved, and stopped pretty early on. So this clutch has been a surprise....

I don't even have the incubator up and running because of the temperatures in the room that I haven't mapped out well, so right now, she is still on these eggs. These eggs are also uncounted... but it looks like a good bunch!

I intend to get things running again, and the blog as well.

I will be starting school in a few weeks, and until then, I'm freeeeeeee!

Here's to getting things back in order.

Have a great day, my friends!

New adventure begins

So I've been very very quiet over the last month or so.

This is because I am on the verge of moving across the country. And as some of you may know, it is a difficult journey generally. Add to that difficulty the idea of moving almost 300 snakes with you, and it gets to be a massive undertaking.

I have been blessed with a fantastic group of friends that have helped me in moving these animals across the country before I myself end up over there.

This helps in two ways: my sanity is relatively maintained while I travel, and I am able to focus more on getting the rest of my life over there.

We are still taking some animals with us while we are on our four day road trip, but not the quantities that would have needed to happen without help.

We are also taking our two dogs, some stuff, and each will be driving a car. It's going to be FUN. It will be an adventure that we have not done together before, and Joel had never lived anywhere but Southern California.

Our personal stuff is already ahead of us as well, being taken in boxes across the country. This means that Joel and I are living out of our suitcases. No fridge, no laundry, no bed. What does that mean? Eating out all the time (and gaining so much weight), minimal clothes and sleeping on the floor.

Tomorrow we are on our way driving. We will take four days, and end up in Charlotte before the July 4th holiday.

So I may be quiet again for a little, but photos will be coming!

Here we go!

The Higher They Rise, the Harder They Fall..

WARNING: There will be dead animals in this blog. It will not be pretty and it will be somewhat unpleasant if you are not comfortable with death/exposed flesh/blood/gooey stuff/grossness.
  

Please turn away now if you are unable to stomach matters as listed above.

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The last two eggs were dead. They were sweating while the others were hatching, but I had slight hope that they may magically hatch out and all would be good.

So when the last Axanthic popped out, I cut the dead eggs.

And of course, I found two more Axanthic Clowns.

The first one was actually reasonably well formed, and what I believe to be a Pastel Axanthic Clown.
This can't really be confirmed, as being in the egg and decomposing somewhat, the colors of animals do tend to change.

But the head color is the indicator that leads me to believe it the most. 

Moving on, I opened up the other egg, and knew that this guy wouldn't have survived anyway.

It was completely underdeveloped. I'm not sure when it stopped, but it looks pretty bad.

The spinal cord and back never fused together, and the head was misshapen.

Had somehow this animal managed to survive to pip, I would have still had to put it down. 

And as you can see, it was still attached very much to the yolk and didn't seal up on the belly either. 

Now let's go back to analysis of the other one. 

The color is pretty established on the malformed animal, so I put them next to each other to compare colors. Remember, they died around the same time.

Do you see what I'm seeing?

Do you see the obvious color difference?

I don't think I'm super crazy, but I tend to err on the side of conservative before announcing official things. Especially considering this would have been a world first, as I understand it.

So... whether it is or not, it didn't make it.

But I will be trying again, and this time with the Pastel Clown for sure to confirm my suspicions.

What do you think?

 But on a positive note, three beautiful girls survived.

Something to be grateful for. 

Have a great day, my friends. 

And remember, life is fleeting. Don't take anything for granted.

Your friendly life reminder from your saddened Ball Python Breeder Wonginator.

It has arrived! TSK Axanthic Clown

So it looks like it's a girl.

But it is also fully out of the egg, and looks VERY similar to the previous TSK Axanthic Clowns that were produced in 2008 by Bryce Honstead. Here is the blog with the photos from way back then.

Here the two sisters (as briefly checked by me, so therefore I get to edit the sex on a future date if necessary) in a nice pretty photo together.

There is another Axanthic pipping right now, with two more eggs to go. The female that produced these girls has popped out a significant amount of Axanthics. Last year the clutch was all Axanthics as well!

I am really very pleased with the way this critter turned out.

As I have mentioned before, I like patternless (alien-head-less) Clowns, and this one fits the bill for sure! 

The one back in 2008 also was very similar to this one, with no pattern on the sides.

I tried to get the real color on camera, and the photo above does the best job at it. They do tend to brown out as they age, and with the morph being as bright and golden toned overall, they dull out to a nice taupe, as shown here on this blog from 2010.

That female in the blog is still here in California, and I hope to track down some updated photos for you to view.

I am very excited to play with this project, as I have been working towards it for a significant amount of time. I just got there a little faster than expected. YAY!

Hopefully I have another one in the egg, or something else popping out that can explain what is going on with the males of the breeding.

Fingers crossed, and check back in tomorrow!

Have a great day, my friends.

Clutch #2, pipping out

So I have a mystery, and I need it solved.

This clutch that is hatching out is from my TSK Axanthic possible het Clown female to my Clown male and my Pastel Clown male.

I had intended only to prove out whether or not this female was Het Clown, and so far over the last three years have had no success. 

This year, however, I had eight eggs to see what the odds were.

So of course, now they are pipping, and the first animal popping out is an Axanthic.


WHAT???????????????

There is no good reason this animal should be hatching from this clutch, considering the fact that the female was bred exclusively to Clown and Pastel Clown males this season.

The slight possibility of retained sperm is there, so I sigh and wait. This little girl popped out on Sunday.



Last night, however, I look in the incubator, and I see this.

WHAAAAAAAAAAAT??????????

So yeah. I hit on the TSK Axanthic Clown. 

I should be stoked, right?

Problem is, I have no idea how I did it!!!

So I'm thinking that this is a possible scenario.

Way back in the olden days, I didn't have clown stuff.. I had Het Clown stuff. I got a Het Clown male from Bryce Honstead of Reptile Image, who produced the first TSK Axanthic Clowns. (Click to read/see the original babies from 2008. I WAS THERE FOR THAT! )

I knew the male was 100% het Clown, and that was it.

Fast forward a year, and I breed the Het to a Pastel and keep all the Het females. I have 0.1 possible Het Clown and 0.2 Pastel possible Het Clowns.

Grow them up, and breed them to a Clown...

I hatched out 1.1 Pastel Clowns from one of the Pastels, which I then held back.

All the while, the TSK Axanthic possible het Clown Female, also from Bryce, is growing and breeding and not showing any signs of anything Clown like.

THIS YEAR, I bred the Clown male (from a completely different source, and pictured first), and the Pastel Clown male that I produced from my clutches wayyyyy back in the day. (Did I mention WAAAAYYYY back in the day?)

So... my thought is that my Pastel Clown male is also het TSK Axanthic. And that my Het Clown from WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAYYYYYYYYYYYYYY back in the day was also het TSK Axanthic.

And I lucked out super style with possible hets.

Cause there is no other explanation for this. At all. (Unless you can think of one...)

So... yeah.

There are three more eggs to hatch, and two or three that went bad. (I'm crossing my fingers on one of them).

We shall see when everyone comes out what the heck is going on.. at least more of the puzzle.

Yeesh.

Have a great day, my friends.

It begins... Clutch one hatched!

So the first clutch of the season hatched on Good Friday, and it was a GOOD FRIDAY!

I have been planning to breed the dame, the Pinstripe het Pied possible het Hypo female, to be able to prove out the Hypo genes. With that, I needed a Hypo Pied something, and the Pastel Hypo het Pied male I had fit the bill.

This was one of those projects I was working on for a while, and finally got eggs from this year.

I am thrilled with the results of the pairing, even if the female has yet to prove to be 100% het Hypo.

The results are as follows:

1.0 100% Het Hypo 66% possible Het Pied
0.1 Pastel 100% Het Hypo 66% possible Het Pied
0.1 Pied 100% Het Hypo
1.0 Pinstripe Pied 100% Het Hypo
0.1 Lemonblast Pied  100% Het Hypo

This female Pied is almost solid with her stripe. I love it!

I had yet to hatch Pinstripe Pieds, and I have to say, I really like them! The stripe still stays, and the orange colors are so much more vibrant from the Pinstripe, I look forward to seeing them grow.

This male is really stunning.. I am very impressed!

And this little girl will be staying with me. I don't have many multiple gene Pied females, so of course, why would I not keep something that has two co-dominant genes and two recessive?

Seems like a no-brainer.

I am very pleased with this first clutch, and the next clutch is due in a few weeks from now as well.

I don't expect a ton of clutches this year due to the move, but if I do get eggs that are around during the move, that will be an interesting transition...

To be discussed (thanks for the question, Kristal!) at a later date.

Have a great day, my friends!

Official Announcement

So I have been holding on to this for a while, and can explain why the blog has been sporadic for the last year or so.

Are you ready for this???

I will be moving.

Joel and I will be moving to Charlotte, North Carolina so that I can pursue my Masters in Physician Assistant Studies. I got accepted into a program in late January.

We will be moving in July, and I have been making arrangements for a while since knowing.

I have known this for several months, but due to the nature of the internet and how things are, I wanted to keep it close to the vest due to my professional obligations and other situations until it was appropriate.

So, this is the reason why I am selling adults, moving babies and being extremely busy.

This is a HUGE change in our lives, as neither of us have lived outside of California for an extended period of time.

Now, as many people have already asked, here's how it will go.

I will still be Heather's Herps. I will still be breeding snakes, although not in quantity as I had been over the last few years.

I will be focusing on pairings that I have goals for, and will maintain a collection that will be manageable for Joel and myself while I am in a very strenuous and demanding program.

I did, and enjoyed it greatly, announce it on Facebook on April Fools Day. That was FUN!

Anyway, please keep this in mind while I am adjusting. I will be able to answer e-mails and ship animals as before, but I may have a period of time when I will be unable to do things.

Thanks for all of your support over the years, and I will be here still!

Have a great day, my friends.

Clutch #3- Long time goals

So this is clutch #3 of the year. This female I've had for a long time, and gave her a few years off before trying again this year. I didn't put her with the male for long, so I can't say I was not surprised when I saw her flat tire-ing a few days ago.

But I went back in to check on her last night, and she was already on eggs.

She was paired up with the Spider het TSK Axanthic het Albino.

As the photo states, there were six eggs and one slug. Hopefully this will be a better clutch for hitting on the Snow Spider.

I've been trying for this project for almost five years now, and I am hoping to finally get it.

Fingers crossed!

And while checking, I saw this happen. This pairing is one of the few that I am still allowing to happen at this point, and I'm excited to see if it comes to fruition.

So yeah.

The season has come pretty early this year, and I'm ready for the babies!

Have a great day, my friends!

Eggs!

The second clutch of the year is here, and I am pretty excited about it.

I've spent a lot more time trying to prove out my Hets this year, and it seems to be working out.

The females that have laid so far are both unproven Hets, and I can't wait to see if they prove!

The TSK Axanthic female that laid last night is a female that was supposed to have proven last year, but did not give me anything close to something I could come to a conclusion on.

Two eggs, three slugs, and the babies that hatched out were both Axanthics.

What am I supposed to do with that?

So now, I get a better chance to see what is going on in there genetically.

Here's to having some really awesome clearly identifiable babies in there with Axanthic and Clown qualities.

I'm going to toast to that.

Have a great day, my friends!

Vacation Recap

So yeah, I'm back.

We went on a cruise on the Mexican Riviera. It was Joel's first time cruising, so that was fun.

Several things to take away from the trip, as will be listed below:

1) Cruises are attended with the majority of the passengers well over 60 years old. (And in our case, many many people from Canada)

2) Mexico is really nice (where we stopped- Cabo, Puerto Vallarta, La Paz and Loreto)

3) Snorkeling *in clear water* is awesome, and I would do it all the time if I could.

4) Whale sharks are also awesome, but if you can't see through the water clearly, you will not be able to see them clearly.

5) Whales move relatively fast. If you don't look and have your camera in the right area at the right time, you will miss an awesome shot.

6) Sea turtles look like trash from up high on a boat, and don't swim very fast.

7) There is such thing as too much food. This occurs often on cruise ships.

8) I didn't take enough photos.

I hope you enjoyed the photos.

It takes me back to a time where I didn't have to worry about anything but not getting ill from walking on moving ground.

I highly recommend it to those with a thirst for relaxation and are okay with limited quarters.

We will be going again eventually.

Maybe not "soon", but soon enough.