Cornsnake!

We got a cornsnake on Sunday. Jon and I went to the Midwest Reptile Expo here in town, where we had a chance to put our research to the test and talk to some breeders. It was a very neat thing to visit, and... well... we got a cornsnake!

He's a four-month old male Okeetee. I have been waiting to get accurate measurements after he's fully adjusted, but he's somewhere between 14-18" long, and I have no guess on weight yet.

He had his first feeding (well, first feeding here at home) late last night, which went very well. No name yet. My husband and I just can't agree on anything. LOL!

And, pictures. Not very many, and not very good, because we wanted to stress him out as little as possible, so I just snapped these really quickly while Jon was transporting him from the travel container into the tank. I think he's going to settle in very well. He's been pretty laid back so far.



You can see some of the neat patterns down his sides here.


Got his head in focus! Huzzah!


Tongue!

He's not very colorful right now, but his oranges will get brighter and his reds will get bolder with every shed. You can kind of get a "preview" of how bright he will eventually be by looking at the orange near his head.

That's all for now!

OMG he's CUTE!

What a cute little snake!

Thanks!

The final decision was between this guy, and then there was an '07 female sunglow motley that was just GORGEOUS!! I took a card from her breeder... and the next expo is in June... if by some miracle she is still available, I might not be able to resist a second time. LOL!

But I digress, this guy IS very cute! Very curious, too. I heard a lot of stories of hatchling cornsnakes being really skittish, but this one doesn't really seem to care. He was more interested in exploring Jon's arm rather than going into his tank on Sunday. Lol! I am really rexcited to see him grow into his colors. The photos I've seen of adult Okeetees are just stunning!

I'm rambling again, aren't I?

What a cute lil guy, I also have a corn snake! Hes a couple years older though.

hes a stunner, i need to find a reptile expo around here, id love to go simply to look but im after a coral or neon coral snow corn...

Everyone's catching the reptile bug around here!

Beautiful little corn, love it <3

Thank you everybody!

I posted these same pictures on the cornsnake forum I'm a member of, and have learned that he's probably not an Okeetee at all, just a very pretty Classic corn. I'm a little bummed about that, mostly because I was really looking for an Okeetee and feel like the breeder lied to us (whether or not it was intentional). Live and learn, I suppose... We put in a lot of research, so it's kind of a let-down to find out that we didn't actually get what we were looking for.

Don't get me wrong, though, I like this little guy! Okeetee or no, he's not going anywhere.

Beautiful! I can see a ton of pigment on that little guy. He's going to glow by 1 year. Was he labeled a normal? He almost looks like a hypo in your photos.

He was labeled as an Okeetee, though after a lot of reading today, I strongly doubt he actually is. At the time, however, I hadn't seen an Okeetee hatchling, and certainly hadn't seen an Okeetee and a Classic side-by-side, so I didn't really know any better. I'm going to call the breeder and ask about it, because there is the possibility that he is still from Okeetee locality lines and just doesn't quite have the looks... but I would think he should have mentioned that when I bought the snake.

I will try to take better pictures this weekend. I know the colors are a little off with those photos because I was taking them so fast... I don't *think* that he's a hypo, but we've already seen that maybe I don't know my morphs as well as I thought. :lol-sign:

Sometimes you get hypos that are darker and look like light normals, and sometimes you have normals who look like light hypos. The best way to know for sure (aside from test breeding) is to know the parents and compare them to their clutchmates. If both parents are normal and all the babies looked like him, I'd say light normal. But if some were very dark and some looked like him I'd say he was a hypo.

To add to the confusion, there are several types of hypo that are inherited separately. The two most common are hypo A and hypo B. They are not compatible, so if you breed a hypo A and a hypo B you get all normals het for both kinds of hypo. But....you can't tell by looking at them which is which. Kathy calls her hypo B okeetees " sunkissed okeetees"

The hypo A's were known first. The hypo B's were discovered by Kathy Love, and cropped up in some locality Okeetee lines she was working with.

"Okeetee" has been the subject of huge debates though. There are locality Okeetees, who have that wide black saddle look and locality okeetees who look more average. Then there are the line bred Okeetees who are made for looks only. Most people go by the "looks" definition.

Just looking at your snake, I wouldn't call him an okeetee. I'd call him a gorgeous normal. If he is a normal, he has a VERY clean background. He's going to be stunning. Although, here is a young guy from locality bloodlines, so not all of them get thick saddle borders:


ETA: Sorry for the novel.

I have been learning a lot about Okeetees today, and it seems like every time I have it figured out, there is just one more thing about them! :lol-sign:

My guy looks very similar to the photo you posted, though. Especially in the saddles, the way the black kind of bleeds into the red... Guess we are just going to have to see how he grows into his colors! Hopefully, the breeder will be able to clear up some of this for us, too...

In the end, it doesn't really matter if he's Okeetee or Normal. I was certainly expecting an Okeetee, but if it turns out he isn't... well, that doesn't make him any less of a cool snake. And next time, I'll know what I'm looking for... a Love Okeetee or an Abbott.

Abbotts......*drools*

The pic I posted is actually one of Kathy love's, from locality lines.

From what I know of corns (I've researched, but I don't own any) it does look like you have a normal. Normals are very stunning too, although I understand the disappointment in not getting what you were told you got.

I'm eager to see how this little one's colour develops.

I just bought a hypo corn snake this past weekend myself!
I've always had ball pythons, so it's a nice change. My corn is the same age as yours, and had his first feeding on Monday morning. So I'm excited to be able to take him out and have a look at him today, finally.

I'm currently looking for a nice blizzard corn, or bloodred corn.

The Abbotts are REALLY cool looking, though that baby you posted from Kathy Love is nice to look at, too! *sigh* I probably shouldn't be considering more snakes right away, though. Lol! Someday, maybe, but just not yet.


I'm really excited to watch him grow up, too! We were told that he is going to be very bright when he gets his adult colors. I just hope I can wait that long!

It's actually okay if he's a normal, but yeah, a bummer if not an Okeetee as labeled. I emailed the breeder today to ask about it, since my snake does look very similar to the one that Romy posted. Hopefully that will clear some things up, though I'm not holding my breath or anything.


I think for my next corn (if/when I get to that point), I'm looking for a sunglow motley. I have seen a couple now, and they are soooooo pretty! Of couse, it would be nice to get a REAL Okeetee, too.

Ok, total snake newbie jumping in here...

Please define the following:

Okeetee
hypo
locality

Okay... Romy will probably be able to define these better than me, but I will do my best what I've learned so far...

hypo - short for hypomelanistic, it's a color morph of cornsnake with reduced black pigment so it ends up with very thin black borders (or gray borders) as compared to normal cornsnakes

locality - in cornsnakes, it's describing a color or morph that is linked to a certain region. For examples, Okeetee is a version of a normal cornsnake that is supposed to have very bold, thick black borders, and was orginally found by the Okeetee Hunt Club in Jasper Co., SC... there is also Miami locality, which is a cornsnake that is more gray (or brown) instead of orange, which is found in the Miami, FL area.

As I've learned today, you can find snakes that fit these colors, though aren't linked to the orginal region by ancestry at all... thus they would not be "locality" Okeetees or Miamis.

Okeetee - I kind of explained this above, but it is the name for a specific color version of the normal corn snake, relating to the region where it occurs naturally



Now we will wait to find out how correct I am when Romy sees this. :lol-sign:

Thanks!

I used to want a snake when I was younger, but then I went with rats instead. Now it's just dogs for me.

Jon and I finally agreed on a name yesterday for the cornsnake. Just in case you were wondering...

Anyways, his name is Reggie. Inspired by Indiana Jones in "Raider's of the Lost Ark".


So there you have it. My little cornsnake will now be known as Reggie, named after the orginal Snake on a Plane. LOL!



That's all. And yes, I am unecessarily proud of myself on this. :banana: