Stripe16

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Stripe (aka: plural Striped)
Most Commonly Used Name: Striped
Mode of Genetic Inheritance: Recessive
Morph Type: Single recessive Mutation
Eye Color: Black pupil & body ground colored iris

 

The pattern gene mutation, Stripe, has been demonstrated in virtually every commonly kept snake species.  Of course, striping is the predominant wild-type pattern for many snake species (i.e. garter, ribbon snakes, yellow rat snakes).  In so much as pattern and behavior are linked – since cryptosis is the primary survival behavior of most blotched snakes and speed of flight is primary in most striped snakes – it would be highly unlikely for striped mutant corns to thrive in the wild.  Snakes with blotched patterns benefit from coiling up in the forest undergrowth where they are reasonably camouflaged.  Since a striped mutant corn snake would have the primary instinct to remain motion-less, imagine how fast it would be killed and/or eaten if it looked like a coiled rope in an otherwise chaotic ground-scape?

At this time, there are at least two striped-type corn snake mutants that are not allelic to the original Striped mutation (not counting the allelic Striped Motley); Terrazzo and Tessera.  Tessera usually demonstrates heavy tessellation pattern on the sides which is never seen on Terrazzo or Striped mutants.  Both Striped and Motley mutants are alleles of the same chromosome locus, but those are the only others . . . so far.  Hence, Terrazzo mutants (formerly called GRANITE corns) owe their appearance to a mutation on a locus other than that of Striped and Motley, so when you breed a Terrazzo mutant to a Striped mutant, neither of them are demonstrated in the progeny.  Presuming both parents of such unions possess no gene copies of other mutations, all the babies produced from Striped X Terrazzo mutants would be wild-type phenotypes.  Both Striped and Terrazzo mutations are capable of producing nearly pattern-less individuals.

Some corn snake keepers and breeders are unimpressed with the often bland appearance of Striped corns, but if you endeavor to make striped versions of other mutations, you must start with a Striped mutant.  Like so many corn snake morphs that are compounds of stripes and other colors and/or patterns, the Striped mutation often does more than just change the pattern.  Frequently, the overall contrast and/or coloration is also altered in the compound product.

 

 

What to expect:
Hatchling striped corns are just what you’d expect; a relatively solidly colored snake with darker longitudinal stripes that are parallel to the spine.  Unlike Ribbon and Garter Snakes, these stripes are NEVER contiguous from neck to tail tip, but outstandingly good examples of this mutation can have contiguous striping to the girdle (where the tail begins).  Otherwise, most Striped corns demonstrate rather good striping that begins at the neck, and runs tail-ward for about half the body.  Then, the stripes begin to break up into dashes that eventually fizzle out somewhere before reaching the tail.  In poorly striped examples, non-striped markings are sometimes exhibited on the dorsum in a form of random and dis-organized ovals or rectangles or bow-ties, etc..  Those usually fade with maturity and are sometimes difficult to see, except in strong lighting.  In striped mutants with wild-type color, the stripes may somewhat fade during maturation, and in some cases can even slowly fade and vanish through maturity.  In the extreme examples of such Striped variants, the stripes can completely (but slowly) disappear between hatching and reaching maturity.  Often, when mixing the striped pattern mutation with other pattern and/or color mutations, the stripes can be all-together absent.   There are completely pattern-less corns of all colors in our trade, but when you breed one of the pattern-less corns to a Striped mutant, a percentage of the progeny will be Striped mutants – demonstrating that they are not pattern-less mutants, but variations of the Striped mutation.  Perhaps the pattern-less or vanishing-striped individuals owe the gradual disappearance of their pattern to a gene modifier or a separate gene mutation?  Breeding trials are now under way in an effort to identify why some Striped corns lose their striping (or actually hatch without it).  Eventually, a pattern-less mutation will be discovered that is not allelic to this mutation.

 

In summary, the primary feature of this mutation (the striping) is highly variable in color-saturation, width, length, clutter, contiguity, breaking, restarting, vanishing, and even absence. Most Striped mutants have relatively consistent stripe width (see Striped VS Striped Motley comparison image below).  Expect the belly to be devoid of the classic corn snake checkering, but some colors and markings can be seen on some individuals.  These are usually relegated to dark stippling and/or one or multiple shades of the predominant body color of the snake.  It’s not uncommon for some Striped corns to have white bellies from the chin to half way back toward the tail, and fade into a pale version of the predominant body color for the remainder of the belly, including the tail.  Some have tiny black flecking over part of all of the belly, but never checkering.  The most common belly pattern I’ve seen in Striped corn mutants is color-less with traces of black stippling, usually following an elongate direction or stream. 

A comparison photograph of a Striped Amel corn and a Striped Amel Motley corn are shown below, so you can see the main distinction between stripes.  In this image, you can see that the pattern schemes are essentially reversed.  The Striped corn on the left has relatively little pattern zones (striping) relative to overall color and pattern, compared to the striped motley on the right that has very little ground color zone.  The Striped Motley on the right essentially has a linear zone of ground coloration between contiguous dorso–lateral striped markings.  The width of ground color zone between the dorso-lateral pattern stripes is the basic way to distinguish between Striped corns and Striped Motley corns.  BTW, Stripe and Motley are alleles of the same Chromosomal locus, but Motley is demonstrated as dominant over Stripe.

 

Important Note:
  These images are not renderings of the actual animals being offered, (except for uniquely offered snakes found in the SURPLUS section of this web site).  We do not provide pictures of individual hatchling snakes for sale, nor do we recommend that you ever choose a new pet based on an image of its neonatal form.  Corns change so dramatically from hatchling to adult, they will NEVER have the same colors or contrasts throughout maturity.While most of the snakes we produce will mature to resemble the featured adult image(s) on our web site, unlike manufactured products that are respectively clones of each other, the nature of polygenic variation results in each animal being similar but not identical to others of its morph. The snake we select for you may not mature to be identical to the pictured examples, but will be chosen based on our experience of observing which neonates will mature to properly represent their respective morph.  We take this responsibility very seriously, and therefore publish the guarantee that we will exchange your SMR snake if it does not mature to be like our advertised examples.