I understand that desert ghost has been newer thus it is limited and more expensive compared to the ghost. I’m curious of the difference of the actual appearance of both, on how they look at hatch, until they grow into full adults. I went looking for pics online, and it was so diverse for both genes. Can someone run me down on some opinions?
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If you mean Hypo by Ghost:
Hypo reduces everything including the black.
Desert ghost tends to keep the contrast of the black better.
The problem with Desert ghost is there can be a number of variants in play a.b and c.
There is alot of variation between Desert ghosts and my understanding is it might be to do with that.
Some Desert ghosts look amazing as adults, others fade out.
I suggest looking at the adults if your going to buy.
Anyway, thats my non expert understanding, others may be able to tell you more or different.
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So I work primarily with Desert Ghost as my main gene, and I have a lot of friends who work both DG and hypo.
Visually, the primary difference is contrast. Hypo (ghost) animals perpetually look like they’re in shed, and will have vibrant but muted colors. Desert ghost animals look hypo when they’re in shed, but normally, they’re high contrast animals - black blacks, white whites, yellows, oranges, etc. Desert ghost animals are also cleaner in terms of pattern and brighter than the genes would be normally on their own.
It was thought for a while that desert ghost has multiple mutations affecting it (hence A, B, and C) but further testing revealed that C is the only one that matters, and A and B have been selected for some other reason but they don’t affect the appearance of the snake. So it’s quite a simple gene to work with, just like hypo.
Some examples of desert ghost vs hypo:
This is a single gene leopard (taken from an ad here on MM):
This is a leopard hypo (from an ad here on MM):
And this is a leopard desert ghost that I produced last year:
You can see the normal leopard is black and brown/tan, the hypo leopard is tan/yellow/grey, and the desert ghost leopard is stark black and bright orange/yellow. Both hypo and desert ghost age better than normal animals, and in my personal opinion DG ages better than hypo, but I know some people who would fight me on that lol.
Desert ghost and hypo both keep nice colors as they age. It just depends on if you want contrast or more even colors.
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Desert ghost only got more expensive when the DG Clown came out. Ten year ago they were $275 and nobody wanted them at price even.
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@inspirationexotics Thanks for the ABC update info.
Do you know why the adults are so variable, i.e better or faded out?
Is it just the line or polygenic then?
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As far as RGI knows it’s not related to the A/B/C combination. Homozygous C makes a visual DG animal, and other than that it’s likely just very polygenic and of course based on the quality of the genes in question. There is bad quality DG out there just like any other gene. This is why I always ask for pictures of parents before buying anything, ever.
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Thats sound advice like you say for any morph. I am going to do that from now on. Quality morphs make all the difference.
Still kicking myself for not getting into desert ghost years ago when they were first affordable. One of many I just didn’t envision what great combos they would make. Even just humble DG pastel in my first visual DG just picked up (got him for dh axanthic clown). Can’t believe how bright he is at around 600 grams. And now with testing I don’t have to worry about if I can ID a hatchling just DG.
Also kicking myself for not having hypo in everything by now. Unfortunately the new DG pastel dh isn’t het hypo too.
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