PICS - New black bloods!

[Invictus]

Hey all,

As promised, here are some pictures and a brief description of my black blood pythons.

They were born in January of this year in Malaysia, imported into the USA, imported into Canada, changed hands a few times, and now they are in my hands where they will stay. :) All 3 are tame like kitty cats, which is great considering they are captive hatched, and have seen more air travel than most *people* I know. :) Their names are Malice, Contempt, and Spite.

Without further ado, the pics!!!

Malice (male)

http://www.invictusart.com/images/Malice02.jpg
http://www.invictusart.com/images/Malice04.jpg

Contempt (Female)

http://www.invictusart.com/images/Contempt03.jpg

Spite (Female) Check out the striped tail on this baby!!!!

http://www.invictusart.com/images/Spite02.jpg

As always, thanks for looking.

[Big_V]

Those females are awesome Invictus. And the male isnt too shabby either. Black bloods look so awesome and im looking forward to pics as they grow up. Nice additions.
Cheers, Ryan

[BOAS_N_PYTHONS]

KEN:

Amazing dude, gotta love bloods and blacks are so cute too. Grow them up dude I know where I am getting my 2006 - 2007 black bloods after.

Cya...

Tony

[HetForHuman]

Right on Ken, lookin good man.

And i think you might have to find a bigger house for all these snakes man....lol

Oh and did you get them from Dan?

[NewLineReptile]

AWESOME KEN!

They are screamers

Brandon

[Yve]

beautiful...beautiful...and beautiful!:) by the sounds of their temperaments maybe you should call them....sweetness, honour and civility??lol

[TonyL]

Great looking snakes Ken!

Love the orange heads. It may be time for a new pair of snakes.

Make sure you post pics every once in a while so we can see the changes.

[SD-SNAKE]

those are sweet......I really like the two females the first one has some really clean markings and the tail on the second one speaks for its self. take care Nick

[Jeff_Favelle]

TRES cool! :D

[Jamie]

Very very nice....can't wait to see them grow up.

[reptiguy]

Beautiful!!!! Love the names too!

[BigDan]

Hey

I want those back!!!!

LOL

They are looking awesome.

Take care and good luck Ken hopefully we will see some eggs in a few years time.

Dan

[BoidKeeper]

Admit it, you like them cause of the name!
:devil: BLACK BLOOD:devil:
Cheers,
Trevor

[Invictus]

Thanks very much everyone. I'm very proud to have such incredible specimens in my collection. :) On a sidenote, I fed them the other day, and as predicted, NO hesitation whatsoever eating F/T jumbo mice.

Trevor - LOL.. oddly enough, you're not the first person to suggest that. :D

BigDan - Ummm... no! Mine! :) Thanks for bringing them in Dan. Hopefully I'll be able to do some *direct* business with you this season. :)

[Borneoblood151]

Hey,
Very sweet indeed, but man they look alot like Borneo's. It's uncanny, that some of the more northern populations centrally, of Sumatran Short-tails, can look so much like Borneo's as babies and juvies. Very nice!

-Angel

[Beardonicus]

Are you sure those aren't Borneos? They look *exactly* like Borneos to me....but I could be wrong. *shrugs*

[Invictus]

Only BigDan can answer that. If they are Borneos, they are the most gentle borneos I've ever encountered. :) But I have seen quite a lot of orange-headed black bloods in my time too. I heard that black bloods have an extra ocular scale. I'll research the scalation and post my findings after I check these guys.

[Invictus]

Based on this extremely scientific article:

http://www.anu.edu.au/BoZo/Scott/PDF%20Files/2001.Keoghetal.P.curtus.pdf

I've examined the head scalation of all 3 of my specimens here, and found the entire scale pattern to be exactly consistent with Python curtus curtus. They also are much much smaller than comparable Python curtus breitensteini that I've personally seen, and certainly more gentle.

Just out of curiosity, how rare is it the find orange headed black bloods such as these? I was under the impression that they were more common than the jet black curtus curtus.

[Beardonicus]

From what I've seen, the blacker Python Curtus are more common here in the states. And also, I have found Borneos to be very gentle if CBB. I have a female who is very sweet as does a friend of mine, except hers is a big male. I also have a P. Curtus baby who is very calm.

[Grant vg]

How ORANGE are there eyes?

I agree that they look similar to borneos... but that is sometimes the case with blacks...
However, those strong head markings are very common in borneos and less common in orange headed blacks.
if your cam is good enough at macros, aerial head scale shots would help to identify them easier....
there not always 100%, but seeing that you have 3...a comparison might be eaiser as far as odds go.
Shots of the scales mainly just behind the frontals would be good.

side angles showing a true representation of there eye colour iintensity would be good too!...

gvg

[Invictus]

David - These guys were CH in Malaysia, so essentially they are wild-bred.

Grant - Their eyes are quite orange, but not as bright as some borneos I've seen. Unfortunately, I don't own a cam, I had to borrow one to take these pics, and it's not very good at all. But like I said, I compared the scalation with particular attention to the nose and ocular scales. P.c.curtus has 3 distinct ocular scales whereas P.c.breitensteini just have the one scale in contact with the eye, and the large scales throughout the subocular region as well. I looked at these bloods very closely under a lamp (I LOVE that they are patient enough to let me do that) and compared it with the top picture in that article - identical. Just for the sake of comparison and accuracy, I compared my Sumatran blood with the Bromgersmai scalation pic - again identical.

So I guess being that they were wild bred and captive hatched, they could only have come from Sumatra... there is no wild intergradation of the species, since Borneo island is completely surrounded by water. If they were CBB, I could imagine they could be curtus/breitensteini crosses, but I don't really think that's possible for wild bred, is it?

[Beardonicus]

My Borneo has a very distinct head......here are some pics:

http://novogate.com/forums/1697/user/24445/12452.jpg

http://novogate.com/forums/1697/user/24445/12453.jpg

[Grant vg]

after looking over the shine/barker paper, my blacks heads, as well as your snakes head scalation (which i had pictures previous to you purchasing them) i would have to say i am 100% sure those are borneos.

it is quite obvious to me now, once i sat down and went over the whole scalation complex. Its been a while...so sue me...lol

what you should be looking at is anterior parietals....not the scale between the orbit and upperlabials.

Ill try and give you a photshopped version when i get home from work.
But in the meantime, the frontals are those two BIG scales right inbetween the eyes. they kind of look like a "house" if you leave out the midline suture.
Posterior to these scales, you will probably notice two big square like scales in pretty much full contact with eachother and then a bucnh of little parietals following behind it, basically clustered together.
If so, this would be a borneo.
Now with a true sumatran.....these two anterior parietals would be pushed out, behind the eyes...with little to no contact at the midline suture, with just a bunch of smaller parietals behind the frontal scales.

Seeing that you did not collect them yourself... you cant be so sure where they were shipped from... and i highly doubt that borneos are solely shipped from the island of borneo.
The few places in sumatra are the power houses of the shipping ports and i would not completely leave out the fact that it is a very short boat ride between the two islands.

anyways, im late for work. ill post some pics later tonight to try and clarify things.
regardless of the outcome, they are all nice snakes... :D

Grant vg

[Beardonicus]

regardless of the outcome, they are all nice snakes.

I agree whole heartedly! :D

[Invictus]

And this is why I come to this board... this is where the experts are, hehehe

I have to admit I'm disappointed about them being borneos, but they are very nice snakes nonetheless. I was planning on ordering some black bloods from VPI soon anyway. Grant, if you could send me your photoshopped scalation pic anyway, because I'm positive that the head scalation was identical to to a black blood... it didn't look at all like a borneo. But I'll trust your expertise.

BigDan - I think we got burned, man.

[Grant vg]

ok...Here we go...lol

This is a head shot of one of your snakes..

http://www.ssnakess.com/photopost/data/507/5MVC-721S-med.jpg

The AP stands for Anterior parietals. these are located directly behind the frontals.
With borneos, a good percentage of them anyways... comes in complete contact at the midline, as do the ones in this pic as well as the other two.
i think in daves extensive experiment it was 30 out of 38 were identical to the snake scales above.

Now this is the scales of my male black.

http://www.ssnakess.com/photopost/data/507/5black_scale.jpg

As you can see the AP's are in no contact with eachother...
This pic is identical to the first head scale on Daves paper.
i believe his paper was Curtus, breitensteini, and brongersmai in that order.
Perhaps you were looking at the wrong one??? or maybe just at the wrong scales...believe me, even i had to read up to make sure i wasn't going scale crazy....lol

And interestingly enough, i looked at my femmes head a little closer and hers come in slight contact... as do some blacks. But rarely would any given three be in full contact.

http://www.ssnakess.com/photopost/data/507/5black_scale_2.jpg

I also see a BIG difference in eye colour... I've had a nice borneo here with eyes that could compete with any black's eyes, but rarely are they this intense.
and judging by the overall colour and pattern of your snakes, one can only assume borneo.

Anyways.
Very tired.

I Hope you will still keep them and enjoy them.

Grant vg

[Invictus]

S'ok Grant... after a very close re-inspection, then a re-re-inspection, then a re-re-re-inspection, I concur - they are borneos.

Like I said, I am a little disappointed, but the odds are I will keep them. It just means I need to build bigger cages when they get older. :)

[Borneoblood151]

Hey Grant,
Well done! still lovely animals and I wouldn't get rid of them just because they aren't blacks.
-Angel

[ethan]

Nice orange heads, I prefer those over the all black bloods.I have male about two years old I'm post a picture here one of these days.Hope to see more pics as they grow up. Later, Ethan