Black Mamba question

Hey,

If you look at the picture of my black mambas, you will see a big differense in the headscales.
Look behind the nose, under the eye and behind the eyes.

What would be the answere to this?

Both are said to be of Tanzanian origin. Born in captivity by Peter Pastor... (?)
--Maybe this question would be for you? :-D --

Anyone else experieced this in your collections?
They look little differnt also in colour, male uniform gray and female more sprackled with "white" dots all over.

Black Mamba question Terrarierna012

// Conny

Hi Conny,

As you can see in this 12 year old picture I too had a pair of Black Mambas with the same kind of difference in scaling.
The one in the front (left) which was my male and the female in the back (right) also possessed similar differences in scaling from the male.
Unfortunately I can not tell you anything about the origin of my animals since I got them from the Zoo in Cologne (Germany) where they stayed after being confiscated by the police.
But I too always wondered why there would be a difference in scaling so your question drew my immediate attention. Smile

I hope to get the answer here even if the animals are already dead and gone.

grtz,

Dexter

Good question.
I have seen this question asked ones more about the viridis.
Dont remember the awnsers given. I will try to find this for you.

Ok

Cool you also have seen this, Dexter..

Thanks Stefan that would be nice!
I know from before there were two different subspecies where one was called

Dendroaspis polylepis antinorii.

The real reason why Im interessted in this is that my male have tried "to do" the female a few times. But there will be no copulation and no eggs.
In their everday life they are doing almost everything together. The bask, sleep and hunt and almost shed at the same time.. but maybe they are too different from each other to have babies?? I dont know??

// C

Adding another male could do a lot for breeding. Wink

I think, almost know for sure that this happens even in one clutch so Peter probably really sold you offspring from the same parents.
The're differences between D. polylepis from different areas in venom and I heard rumors before about subspecies but maybe I should shut up and wait if Wolfgang has something interesting to say about it. Yours are really different, that's for sure.

Please no more pics. I'm starting to miss my D. polylepis... One of the nicest snakes to keep. Always curious, always ready for action, lots of movement and of course, deadly beautifull. When I have more space again...

Cheers, Ro.

Hi Conny,

nice to see you still have polylepis from us. Trully said I don`t remmember if you got babies from us or big animals, but according to your post I think you got babies. They are really bred by animals from same locality, correctly said Tanzania. It was the only case when we bred this species so far. We still have parents of your animals in collection! Surprised

)
We are building them new cages now (for trio 2.1) so I hope it will stimulate them for breed again Surprised

) Let`s see what future can bring us...

Cheers,
Peter

Hello Peter.

I think they were bought from you as babies.
Im not the first owner..

Peter if you know the true origin (Tanzania) of your collection can you see any differences
in the number of headscales?

Do you have pictures of the parents? That would be nice to see!

// Conny

That's common in any reptile. Some animals may present divided or fused scales. Even a side of the head can be completely different from the other.

As Hugo says this is common. Even guide books will give scale counts as 2-3 preoculars etc. What suprises me the most is that people who don't even know a basic fact like this are keeping such potentially lethal snakes.

Oh, never tought about that.. Maybe I should stop care about things!?

Try getting books like "A complete guide to the snakes of Southern Africa" by Johan Marais of someting similar so that you can learn about these snakes. As I said I thought some one who kept them would know these things as they are very basic information.
Don't worry about what I say, just don't get bitten.
....or like you say just stop caring....

I don't see this absolute correlation beween knowing every detail in squamation and beeing a good and serious keeper.
If we judge this way, we should request at least 80 % of all venomous keepers to aquire this additional knowledge about these animals before getting in touch with'em.
I know what you mean, Roger, but your reaction seems to be a bit overacted in my opinion.
I usually have more problems with people spelling the scientific names of their snakes completely wrong - this may indicate they didn't read any informations, books, papers etc.
regards
Peter

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