im no expert on color mutations though so will be watching this thread with interest,come on people,lets have some expert advice here,what the heck is that northern classed as
Anyone seen an axanthic bluey?????
Sorry to be flogging a dead horse but they are not just hypomelanistic. Hypomelanistic means just a reduction in melanin and melanin derived pigments. Which they do but they also have a reduction (although not complete) in the yellow/red family of pigments too. So in addition to being hypomelanistic they are also hypoxanthic and hyperythistic. While agreeing they are not the same mutation as the leucistic snakes they are leucisticish since they are an overall reduction in chromatophores except for the eyes. Perhaps the term dilute would suit better? if you have a close look at these two siblings you will see the paler one is paler in all pigments not just melanin
Wow a bit to wade through, unfortunately quite a bit of mis-information as well. The whole thread I am referring to not the quote above.
Hypomelanistic is the same as dilute.
Seeing and holding the animal would solve the query directly, but from the photos the blue tongue is hypomelanistic.
I have held in my hands various leusistic reptiles overseas, (the leusistic nile Monitor that was showed a few pages back was one) plus littlerally thousands of other mutation reptiles. Once you have seen and held a leusistic reptile you truely understand the term leusistic. It is hard for me to explain but basically the scales are a un-natural white. My wife recently brought a couch which is white enough to call leusistic It is not a bleached out white, rather an intense white.
Albinos are hypomelanistic as well just more extreme than the "average" hypermelanistic animal. Think of hypomelanism as varying degrees of dilute. Sometimes you have just a bit of dilution, for example some of the bredli going around, then you have some more dilution such as the "white" blue tongues floating around Qld then the extreme being albino. On a side note the terms T+ and T- are used frequently but they are terms that to the best of my knowledge have not been proven.
The white of a leusistic reptile is very intense.
Hope that helps.
Regards
Euan
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