King Crosses

[stevesemerko]

I was just wondering what you deem acceptible when it comes to crossing cal. kings with other kings. If you don't understand I will give some examples:

Cal. King x Florida King
Cal. King x Desert
Cal. King x Mex. Black
Etc.

Thanks Everyone

Steve

[Vanan]

None is acceptable IMO. Why would want to cross them? out of curiosity.

[Katt]

I'm with Vanan, none of those crosses produces anything that's particularly nice looking.

If you're going to cross at least keep esthetics in mind. The snake should look like something different. Getulas are too similar to produce anything really different and babies could be mistaken as pure.

[Tim and Julie B]

It is odd that you can cross any type of corn and it is exceptable but with other snakes it is not. It is one of those odd perception things. I don't really like the idea of mixes but I guess it would depend on the out come. If no one breed other reps. together then you would never have gotten some of the wierd morphs we have now. I take it those are just an example of what you are talking about and not ones you are thinking of doing. But pure kings are worth more so keep that in mind also.

[Vanan]

Tim, the corn crosses happen to be more popular because they add red from the corn colour. You have to admit, most snakes with red are nice looking.

[stevesemerko]

Vanan:
I personally don't want to cross them but I was just curious as to what people thought because I have seen some of these crosses on internet sites.

[Tim_Cranwill]

Tim, are you talking about corns as being all Elaphe? If you just mean crossing an amel corn with an anery corn, they are the same animal in every way except for appearance. They are both Elaphe guttata guttata. It would be like breeding a striped cal king to a banded one.

Just thought I'd mention that in case anyone else wondered as I once did!

[gonesnakee]

I am in favour of select hybrids ie: jungle corns/kings, but I do not think that every idiot with any adult male & female snakes of different species should breed them just for the sake of babies (or should I say mutts). I myself considered this with a couple female Rat Snakes I have whose mates are too small until next year, but gave my head a shake & decided to wait for their mates & keep them "pure". I had some guy call me last week wanting me to sell him "ANY ADULT FEMALE I HAD OF ANY SPECIES" so he could try to breed it againest an adult male that he had as a pet & had recently hasds probed. I beleive he said it was a "yellow rat", but he didn't care what he got to go with it as long as it was a female. He wanted a Corn, King, Milk whatever, I probably could have sold him a boa & he'd been trying to mate them. Can you say "IDIOT" boys & girls, I can, did & sent him packing after a quick lecture. Use your heads & think before you try to "play God" with exoitic hybrids. Mark I.

[Tim and Julie B]

I just meant that localities aren't as important as with other snakes. You can define some snakes right down to their island or peninsula or small county but that is not the case with most corns. It seems like they all get lumped together. All I am saying is mixing say Florida kings is not desired. Can be done but people want to keep the locals true. With corns you can mix a Texas local with a Florida and no one cares. That is all I meant. If it continues that way there will be no locale specific breeding like BCI's. It is getting dahm near impossible to tell the difference between certain locals even if they have the same Latin name I would not want to breed a Surinam with a Nicaraguan. Or for that matter Leopard geckos. There are two separate sub species in the wild but through years of cross breeding there is no difference in captive breed. How far do you mix them? At what point do you stop? Eventually locality specific reptiles are going to be more desirable because they will be so rare. Just my opinion. Hope you enjoyed reading this rant as much as I enjoyed typing it!Tim

[Vanan]

I agree with Tim. Which is why I'm all pikcy about snakes and their locality now. Helps with no grabbing every snake which comes my way too! Hehe.

[Colonel SB]

In my oppinon it is never right to cross snakes that would not have to the chance to do so in the wild. And jsut for the record Cal Kings x Desert Kings is a natural hybrid and is called a Yuma King. It was once thought to be a seperate species but it is just an intergrade.