Spotted's, Children's and Stimson's Pythons?

[TheReptileCove]

Hey all, this may be a stupid question, but whilst doing my research etc. i noticed these three animals seem to look rather similar? Are they similar species or even just different names for the same species? Also are there any major differences in them?
Thanks

[Albino93]

heyy...thats because they are all in the same family, antaresia. there are 4 seperate species in the family antaresia that all look very similar, the only differences would be pattern, colour and size, other then that they are pretty much the same

[moussaka]

*Genus Antaresia

[Albino93]

*Genus Antaresia

haha my mistake, thankyou for correcting me

[moussaka]

haha my mistake, thankyou for correcting me

I'm a bit of a taxonomy pedant (and a massive biology nerd), please forgive me! 8D

[Albino93]

haha yeh (i shall forgive u this time lol). i dont know why i never thought of genus rather then family, mind blank i guess lol

[TheReptileCove]

Thanks, but is there easy ways to spot the differences between them?

[Waterrat]

A . maculosa (Spotted python) has ragged-edged blotches that aren’t transversely aligned and tend to coalesce (come together to form a mass) into longitudinal streaks on the neck and tail.

The pattern of A. stimsoni (Stimson's python) is transversely aligned with no coalescing on the neck and tail. A stimsoni generally has a paler ground colour than A. maculosa and a lower lateral line anteriorly (towards the head).

A bit stuffy, I know.

[Coppersimon]

Just a question that is sort of on the same line. In the species list for NSW it lists the Stimson as a Liasis. Is this a old out dated term or a mistake? I've always wondered about it.
Cheers

[Albino93]

yeh i noticed that to, tecnically its meant to be antaresia, id say they've made a mistake and couldnt be bothered fixing it, just like alot of people still call them stimpsons python

[konp69]

They used to all be grouped under genus Liasis and were all considered the same species of snake with regional differences/morphs. A little later they divided and reclassified them into Antaresia but spotted and childrens were still considered the same snake. Then, semi-recently they decided to make them separate.

I have two Children's pythons that look a lot like Spotteds, and I've seen plenty of vice-versa examples as well. The paperwork for the both of them say Antaresia childreni so I'm gonna go with that, but even so, there still seems to be some confusion as far as the similar-looking examples of each species goes.

[cheekabee]

Has anyone bred different different members of the Antaresia group together out of curiosity. And are there any cool morphs, traits out there.

[konp69]

Has anyone bred different different members of the Antaresia group together out of curiosity. And are there any cool morphs, traits out there.

Well you've got your blondes, caramels, patternless, striped, T+, albino, etc etc etc that seem to show up with moderate frequency. Also, I would imagine there is a high degree of "cross" breeding (I put "cross" like that because as I mentioned until recently they were considered the same species, so the idea of hybrids only came along due to a taxonomic formality) because sometimes it's just too difficult to tell the difference between the two. Like my two (paperwork) childreni that look for all the world like spotteds. Short of DNA analysis by an expert there's probably no way to tell for certain.

[Albino93]

Well you've got your blondes, caramels, patternless, striped, T+, albino, etc etc etc that seem to show up with moderate frequency. Also, I would imagine there is a high degree of "cross" breeding (I put "cross" like that because as I mentioned until recently they were considered the same species, so the idea of hybrids only came along due to a taxonomic formality) because sometimes it's just too difficult to tell the difference between the two. Like my two (paperwork) childreni that look for all the world like spotteds. Short of DNA analysis by an expert there's probably no way to tell for certain.

i am now curious to see these childreni of urs, do u have any pics?
okay i just had a quick look at ur thread and that definatly looks like a spotted

[konp69]

i am now curious to see these childreni of urs, do u have any pics?
okay i just had a quick look at ur thread and that definatly looks like a spotted

I know (and it gave me some confusion when I noticed), but I've decided to go with what the paperwork says they are. They could look like Norwegian blues for all I care (beautiful plumage, innit?) but if the paperwork says A. childreni on them (which it does), that's what I'm going with.

Here's a pic of the two of them - Ripley (the female I purchased off another member a short while ago - also had paperwork stating A. childreni) and Ayame (the male that you would have seen in the other thread)



It's plainly obvious that childreni or maculosa (or dead parrot), they're both the same.