What are these?

[mark_w]

Offspring


and another, different animal


I saw an ad for these babies, which to me look very Kei-like. So, I asked to see pics of the parents.

Parents


Not sure what they are, Kei x IJ?

Mark.

[Dakota]

Kei x Northern?

[Ophidiophile]

You're right - Those are certainly not pure Keis. They are missing the white rostral scale, the typical neck pattern, and the coloration on the legs (particularly the front legs) is wrong as well. To be honest, from looking at the adults, I'm not so sure those have any Kei in them. They look to me like they could be principally (but maybe not only) IJ x Northern.

Whatever they are exactly, they definitely look like mutts.

[Dakota]

They have the long, skinny tail.. which is neither a IJ nor Northern trait.. rather a gigas, keyensis, or Merauke.

[Ophidiophile]

I don't know, I have seen some IJs with relatively long tails. Look at this guy (photo isn't mine but is copied off another reptile forum EDIT: I just discovered that photo is actually mark w's!).



The adults def look to me like they could be Northern and something similar to this guy.

[mark_w]

How funny - I recognise that pic from several years ago! It was one of the first times I had bred IJs. I must admit I see keyensis in the tails on the adults too but also the babies really look like they have keyensis in them to me.

[Richard.C]

They look alot different to any ij x northerns ive seen,i cant see northern in them at all,the speckling on rear of them is interesting

Dakota some ij have very gigas traits including the long skinny tail,lots of variety in them

Ij x some type of gigas,possably keis would be my guess,but who knows,could be bits of anything in them

[Dakota]

Even has the weird kink which isn't uncommon with Keis. I think they have Kei in them, just not totally sure on the other side..

Maybe it is a new, unknown gigas subspecies perhaps.

[Jeff]

Without anyway of knowing for sure, my guess is that the parents are siblings, and one of the grandparents was a Kei, and the other was either a different sub-species of gigas or a scincoides.

[Katrina]

Even has the weird kink which isn't uncommon with Keis. I think they have Kei in them, just not totally sure on the other side..

Maybe it is a new, unknown gigas subspecies perhaps.

I'm confused - you're saying kinks in the tail is a Kei trait??

[Dakota]

No.

[Ophidiophile]

I attributed the speckling to them having something like Kimberly Northern in them.

Sort of Like:


(credit: http://bluetonguelizard.com.au/)

+



=




This was my reasoning. But obviously, this is just a guess.

[Richard.C]

I was thinking that must be your thought david

The more classic northerns can have that speckle look down there tails to,not normally on the body though

Something odd to is the offspring pics they look bigger/more mature than the supposed parent pics,im thinking they arent the actual parents,but in fact more offspring,maybe to hide fact of a cross breeding?

From looking at pics,keies can have a freckly wash through them,usually hidden in there intense coloring,and im sure fatalS showed pics of her tannies once and there heads were actually quite speckled

The most ij looking one in apparent parents pic,lighter one at rear has gigas looking black markings on rear sides of head,plus they have that long skinny gigasy look,ive not noticed that with ij northern crosses,but yeah,ij crosses can be highly variable,usually keeping the ij look,only ones i havnt seen that look more ij are in that recent ij x halmahera thread,those babies look mostly gigas

With out knowing any particulars about parentage though,its only guesses at best

[xxmonitorlizardxx]

Eastern x IJ?

[Jeff]

I really don’t think you could end up with those babies, especially the first one, without some Kei blood in there somewhere. Also, as far as I know, there really isn’t anyplace on earth where both Kimberlies and gigas exist. Certainly anyone who possessed a Kimberly, in or out of OZ would have the intelligence to not cross it with anything.

[Richard.C]

Eastern x IJ?

If they were in canada ,then perhaps,lol

[donkeybuff]

To me, the head indicates that there is some scincoides in there somewhere, but I definitely see some Kei as well.

[mark_w]

Thanks guys. I think most agree that they have some keyensis in the mix, along with some IJ. If you remember that northerns are nowhere near as common in the UK as the US (and Easterns even less), this is most likely I think. It is a shame because when I first saw the pics I thought they were baby keis. Shows you how useful it is to get pics of the parents too. Rich has a good point in that the pic of the parents shows young animals. Could be an old pic I guess. Either way, I won't be buying them!

Mark.