@armiyana Yeah, I recall as much! It slipped my mind while ordering to also add in lesser. I emailed them and they’ll be resulting the shed for leopard later today, so I asked if there’s any way for me to purchase and add on a test for lesser - a long shot, but if there’s any way to do that instead of waiting for the next shed since they still have the one I sent there, that’d be kind of awesome.
Hopefully whenever you get the test ran, the result comes out as what you’re wanting lol! Sounds like she has some beautiful babies!
@inspirationexotics I had the gut feeling he was just a het as well from the jump when I pulled him out the day I got him and saw the freckles, but I wanted to hold out hope when the breeder was adamant that he got the ID correct. Now comes the fun part of emailing him nearly a year later to say, “Um, actually…”
Not that I think I’d get any recompense at this point, but if I get the test ran and he comes back positive for lesser, it’d be my due diligence to inform the breeder, yeah?
If I have to send in a new shed to test for lesser, I’ll throw in a test for pastel as well. I definitely see what you mean, with how his head has become even more blushed out over time. The real head scratcher will be if he comes back negative for both leopard and lesser!
It’s entirely up to you when it comes to letting the breeder know. As a breeder, I would absolutely want to know if I sold someone something that was mis–IDed - I’d try to learn from it. That said, it’s really an individual thing. The breeder may get super mad about it, or they may be completely reasonable.
One breeder who sold me a mis-IDed animal a few years back did offer me a partial refund when I bred her and proved her out without one of the genes he listed, but that’s a pretty rare occurrence - I don’t know that I’ve ever heard of another breeder doing that.
I’d similarly want to know if I had mis-identified an animal, so I do think once the last results come back I’ll shoot him an email. The people at RGI were incredibly flexible so I was able to add on the test for lesser, which will get ran and hopefully resulted today!
Hopefully he doesn’t get upset, it’s human to make mistakes, but some people do take it as a personal insult to be corrected so we’ll see. I’ve got a few animals from this breeder, and the others do look exactly as expected for the gene combo, but his response will likely decide whether or not I do business again in the future.
I found out a girl I bought as Coral glow Mojave fire het hypo(og) actually didn’t have fire. Kinda sucks cause I was aiming for vanilla cream with a super vanilla male. But on the plus side she is a A+ expression of Mojave.
Just kinda how things were before genetic testing was available
Bummer for sure, though it’s great that she’s still a knockout of an animal. Kind of how I feel about Sundae - despite not being mojave or super banana, he’s a great looking animal imo. Just gotta figure out what’s going on with him!
It’s definitely just a part of the game, since it gets so difficult to ID by looks once you really start layering in other genetics. The shed testing is a game changer for sure, and will be super helpful in picking out my own holdbacks for this season.
Wow that’s really surprising. This noodle just doesn’t look like a two gene lesser banana to me. Especially with that paradox spot.
The only other thing I can think of offhand is that Mystic/Phantom can be almost indistinguishable from Mojave sometimes. Maybe this was the case if the parent definitely had that Mojave look.
I thought the same, really am shocked the leopard came back negative. Still waiting on the results for lesser, it was prepped to be run this morning. Think if he is pastel like inspirationexotics suspects, that could account for some of the busier pattern?
If for whatever reason he does come back negative on lesser, I’ll be incredibly stumped.
This might be my next move then, to check these, but I’ll wait for his next shed. As of right now though the only thing he’s tested positive for is banana, how crazy.
I’m not surprised that leopard came back negative as I don’t think he looks leopard, but I am surprised lesser came back negative. I second testing phantom/mystic. All I see in him for sure is pastel and banana and then what I think is a BEL gene, but honestly, he could be cinnamon or black pastel and was mislabeled as mojave or lesser. I have a banana black pewter girl whose color & shading is almost identical to his.
I agree, just trying to put a pin in what is frustrating lol. I think that plus possibly checking for pastel and cinnamon/black pastel would my next move. And thank you! He’s undeniably pretty, despite not being what I was needing.
I was thinking perhaps lower expression with the way a couple spots were wacky plus his paradox spot, but alas it didn’t prove out. Also shocked about lesser though, and will be looking into a BEL complex panel.
Funny enough, there was actually another person on reddit that suggested he looked like a banana pewter combination. Perhaps on top of the BEL complex panel, I should throw in pastel, black pastel, and cinnamon? But at this point I need to ask myself if it’s really worth it. Even if those end up being positive, it does little good for me since I already have a sterling ghost male for anything I’m working pewter into atm. As of now he’s more or less useless in any breeding plans and will likely just end up a pretty pet.
I did message the breeder, and he started off by asking what would I like to do “if there was an error”. A little cautious answering that though, since I’m still uncertain on anything aside from him only testing positive for heterozygous on banana, despite it seeming obvious there’s more going on…
After a little further digging, this might be a pastel cinnamon banana ??? Combo. I have a banana cinnamon super pastel in my saves and it looks almost exactly like him, but with less melty alien heads and is much brighter. The ??? Part is whatever is making the alien heads melted like that.
Maybe this was a clutch fertilized by two males, but the majority were sired by the pairing the breeder gave you, and this little guy was fertilized by male 2, just going out on a limb here.
Perhaps, I suppose I could see the patterning lending to that with a banana filter. I didn’t think about the possibility of a dual sired clutch though, potentially retained sperm from a previous breeding even. I’ll be sure to suggest that with the breeder and see if that doesn’t get further information to figure out what may have happened here.
As of now though, I guess my next question is what do I tell the breeder? I do think he’s a pretty animal and like having him, but for obvious reasons I’m disappointed that nothing proved out other than him being het banana. They want to know what I’d feel would be fair for this, and if I’m being honest since I brought up the issue when I bought him but the breeder stood by their claim, I feel I’m at least owed the costs of the RGI tests that disproved it, if not further compensation for his lack genetics/how he’s resulted, even though he’s definitely got SOMETHING else going on. Plus, it’ll cost me more money and time to actually figure out what else is going on (if he isn’t just a hella oddball banana). Would that be fair to ask to be refunded the costs of the testing plus being compensated the difference between what I paid for vs what would be asked of a single gene banana? I feel like on paper that’d be fair, but I know with these animals once we start layering in so many genes it can get hard to tell. Am I being harsh?
That’s a really tough call.
The price of the 4 shed tests is 50% the price for a super banana pastel Mojave Cinnamon on the market right now. The market is oversaturated and constantly pushing so a snake worth 700 last year could be selling for half of that this year.
I would say the refund of the test price is not a poor request if it was addressed earlier after purchase. But given the time between the purchase and now it’s a rough ask. At the very least, had it been me I would offer either a discount worth the test costs off a current snake purchase or if I did happen to have one close to the original combo a significant discount off the current price. Or just the price of shipping if the discrepancy was that much.
I would absolutely be curious to see what the results are of a cinnamon/black pastel test, but yeah, completely reasonable that it should be monetarily worth it for you to continue the testing. Could you ask the breeder for pictures of the parents? I’ll be honest, if we had pictures of mom and dad we might be able to determine for ourselves whether he’s phantom/mojave or cinnamon/black pastel.
I think asking for cost of the test and/or a partial refund is reasonable. I don’t know that it would be easy to ask for the difference in price, just because the market can change so quickly. Maybe just see what the breeder is willing to work with you on and go from there? If this was my snake that I had mis-IDed I would honestly refund the whole thing if I could, but that doesn’t mean everyone will feel that way or be in the position to do that.
Let me see if I can find a younger picture of my girl who I think looks very similar.
She does look a bit different, but she is a mix of genes. The shading is almost identical though, and the lingering purple your guy still has is exactly what hers looked like when she was a little bit smaller. She is a banana black pewter amon (crypton, double het cryptic and clown) and also het pied and desert ghost.
Actually paid for 5 shed tests since I added the one for lesser, putting me $105 in the hole on that. Store credit/discounts are a bit unfavorable unfortunately as I am limited on space with (hopefully) upcoming clutches, and it doesn’t seem there’s another animal with those genetics or something similar enough to fill the hole in my plans it’s left, anyhow. I did at least bring up the same day I received him my concerns on him not being super banana since he had black fleckings. More or less though, I just laid out the details and left the ball in their court on what they feel should be done about this situation. I’m definitely flexible, and as disappointing as it is for things to not pan out, it isn’t the end of the world. Still like my pretty little guy!
I would be too, it just may be a minute before I can justify throwing more cash down on further testing lol. If/when I do though, I’ll definitely be updating here! And I did ask if they had any pictures available of the parents, or if the female had been paired with another male that season or the one prior.
That’s of course fair, though looking at the prices on the breeder’s site it doesn’t seem it’s really fluctuated much since last August. But I did just leave the conversation open to their opinions on what to do about the situation, so hopefully we can reach an amicable solution!
What a pretty girl! I can definitely see some resemblance. I will say though, I actually think his purples have been getting more intense as he’s grown in some spots, rather than fading out. Also the matter of his chaining/melty alien heads, though like you pointed out your girl has a bit more going on with her that could explain the differences lol.
Breeder got back to me and is doing everything to make things right. They’re offering to send me a super banana BEL complex animal free of charge to compensate while letting me keep Sundae. Genuinely more than I would have ever asked of them and could not be more appreciative.
These are the two I have to choose from - Super banana enchi pastel butter and a super banana butter.
