Odd colored Large Eyes Pit Viper

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LouB747
Posts: 1184
Joined: June 7th, 2010, 8:50 am
Location: Huntington Beach, CA

Odd colored Large Eyes Pit Viper

Post by LouB747 »

Found an odd brown pit viper.....

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uM7suIcXTec&t=610s[/youtube]
AEthelred
Posts: 69
Joined: July 16th, 2019, 10:56 am
Location: North Adams,Massachusetts

Re: Odd colored Large Eyes Pit Viper

Post by AEthelred »

Another great video Lou,you are certainly couragous picking up that pit viper,likely wouldn't kill you but would have been a painful bite.
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Porter
Posts: 2418
Joined: March 19th, 2011, 7:43 pm

Re: Odd colored Large Eyes Pit Viper

Post by Porter »

I watched your video today before work. Awesome brownie :beer: I love finding rarities like that. That’s my favorite aspect of the field Herping. I think you would call it an Aberrant or possibly a morph. Occasionally I come across red colored yellow bellied racers. I like to call them morphs, but I was told the correct way to refer to it is aberrant. Although, I’m right there with you with the confusing terms. I’ve heard more than Once from different people, Call a striped gopher snake a striped phase gopher snake. Which of course goes against the definition of the word. I actually asked Gary Nafis about that this year. He agrees that phase isn’t correct terminology.

Enjoyed the visit and was left with the thought of… Boy do I miss my hair :lol:
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Porter
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Joined: March 19th, 2011, 7:43 pm

Re: Odd colored Large Eyes Pit Viper

Post by Porter »

But maybe I’m not understanding your video… And you were Referring to phases in vipers. Like perhaps it’s going through a brown phase, Like the green babies that eventually become blue as adults…?
dendrelaphis
Posts: 172
Joined: February 28th, 2014, 12:10 am

Re: Odd colored Large Eyes Pit Viper

Post by dendrelaphis »

Hi Lou, wonderful, I know this species well from Koh Chang, alsways great to encounter! I guess the Oligodon is an O. taeniatus.
dendrelaphis
Posts: 172
Joined: February 28th, 2014, 12:10 am

Re: Odd colored Large Eyes Pit Viper

Post by dendrelaphis »

If it represents a mutation that reduces fitness (in the evolutionary sense) and thus will be selected against, it would be called aberrant I guess.

However, it may represent a mutation that has been established in the population because, initially, it increased fitness simply because it was rare (and therefore agreed less with search image of predators). The genotype would then become more frequent through selection untill the different colour morphs would have equal fitness. In such a case (see for instance Oligodon purpurascens) it would be called "colour pattern polymorphism"
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