We have turned a lifelong passion for reptiles into a dream come true hobby/aspiring small business.
I'm receiving some messages and I have been trying to reply for hours, yet messenger is failing to send from either phone linked to this account, so I apologize to those trying to reach me. I'm trying to get back to you but technology has failed me. Feel free to reach me at my personal Steve Blair account if you wish, and if not I will reply as soon as the wizards wave their magic wands and fix this crap.
Apologies again!
We have decided to let a few female breeders go, downsizing a bit so they're up for discussion. Motivated to move them quickly.
1250 gram Hypo Lesser.
1950 gram Pied 50% Het Hypo.
1700 gram Enchi Clown.
DM ONLY please, if interested!
We officially began our pairings for the 2024 hatching season this past weekend, on Friday. The weather change and storms moving in was an optimal time to try and get a jump on the breeding season whilst the weather was naturally conducive to breeding behavior.
Paired Vlad (Pinstripe Pied het Albino) to Winnie (Pied het Albino), Zell (Super Lesser BEL) to Iris (Pastel Lesser) and Kain (GHI Leopard Yellow Belly) to Tifa (GHI Mojave). Upon checking tubs yesterday, we had three locks. Was really worried that Vlad wouldn't be ready for the task, but he will apparently be a good workhorse for us. I'll admit, it's almost funny seeing our smallest male breeder (700 grams) locked up with our largest female (4000+ grams at last weighing), but we're happy to see it nonetheless.
Didn't want to snap pics of the locks and disturb them, so here's a couple older pics of Winnie and Vlad for tax. More pics to come as we keep rollin along!
Our holdback female BELs from last year, Paine and Raine, now at 600 and 800 grams. These beautiful ladies are growing nicely and just might be ready to breed by the time the 2024 pairing season starts. They both moved into their adult FB70 tubs today, so I thought it would be a good opportunity to share their progress!
This clutch is eating well and ready for new homes. DM only please, if interested. Additional and individual pics available for serious inquiries.
1.0 Clown poss. Blade
0.1 Clown poss. Blade
1.0 Super Enchi Blade Clown
0.1 Blade Enchi Clown
5 different females here from the same clutch. The variability and color contrast between them is just phenomenal!
An excellent example of the progression with stacking multiple genes. Blade Clown, Blade Enchi Clown and Blade Super Enchi Clown. Note the progressive pattern reduction, and the higher expression of orangish brown coloration as the stack increases. Enchi is still one of the coolest homozygous traits that have a major influence on Clown.
Hatchling introduction, from the clutch of 4 that was produced by Ignis and Rydia (Enchi Leopard Butter × Banana Champagne). This is the introduction I had forgotten about previously. All four will be available to go to new homes once they've proven to consistently eat.
We never show our other critters so here ya go, enjoy! 😊
Introductions to CL2303 and CL2302. Realized after filming that we haven't actually done an introductory video for the Ignis × Rydia clutch yet, so that will be happening soon after all.
Finally did a photo shoot for CL2304. Tried to get a video to work but my phone spazzed and stopped recording with one animal left to show, so I'll get back to that another time 😄.
Female, Banana
Female, Banana Butter
Male, Banana Champagne Leopard
Male, Banana Enchi Leopard
Official introductions of clutches 2303 and 2302 to come in the next few days.
Good things to come!
Officially introducing the crown jewel of this hatching season, and our first holdback. We've named her "Rikku" and she's going to be an amazing addition to the MHM family. Banana Pastel Enchi Blade Clown.
Our first litter of ASF rats has hit the ground, faster than we expected. Good things to come!
Final hatchling has left the egg and entered this world! Blade Enchi Clown female. That makes this a 2.2 clutch. All four hatchlings are defect-free and appear alert, healthy and active, so we couldn't ask for more!
..and just as quickly as the 2023 hatching season pounced upon us, it has dissipated as all things must.
Aside from the very disappointing start with our first clutch failing, it has been a mixture of "oh, this is nice, very nice" all the way up to "holy crap, can you believe this clutch was that good!?!?" We have nothing bad to say. The hatching season was an otherworldly success in spite of the crummy start.
This will be the final hatchling update for just a little bit. In about a week and a half, we will be back with clutch updates and reveals, after they have all shed out and we've begun preparing to move them into their own tubs and getting them started on food. We might post another video before then but we might not.
In finishing this post, I want to thank all of you who have followed us along this journey. Some from the beginning and some more recently, but you know who you are and so do we. We cannot possibly tell you how much we appreciate your support. It has already been an exciting journey, and just wait until next hatching season because it's shaping up to be even better! From the bottom of our hearts, thank you all! Good things to come!
Next 2 out! Female Blade Clown and male Blade Clown. Unusually dark dorsal backgrounds on these animals has me curious to see how they're going to look after shedding. Possibly not anomalous at all, but I'll be reaching out for opinions anyway. One more still hasn't left the egg, but it's definitely Enchi Blade Clown and we'll post a pic when it's out. Good things to come!
Fresh out of the egg. Super Enchi Blade Clown, male. 😍
Clutch CL202302 is all finally out of the egg. We will s*x them again at around 150 grams to be certain, but this looks to be a 2.5 clutch (2 males, 5 females).
Males are:
Pastel Enchi Banana Blade Clown
Pastel Enchi Blade Clown
Females are
Pastel Enchi Banana Blade Clown
Pastel Enchi Blade Clown
Banana Enchi Clown
Enchi Blade Clown
Pastel Blade Clown.
Updates to follow, good things to come!
Clutch all out of the egg and cleaned up, pre- shed.
Banana, female.
Banana Butter, female.
Banana Champagne (prob) Leopard, male, female maker.
Banana Enchi Leopard, male, female maker.
First two Clowns out of the egg. The darker one is Banana Enchi poss. Blade Clown, female. She will be staying with us, definitely. The brighter one is Pastel Enchi Blade Banana Clown, male, female maker. He may be looking for an address change in the future.
Bittersweet. Final egg cutting video of this season. PLENTY of updates and excitement to come, though!
Correction before I get too far here: Final snake at the end, I accidentally said it's ID is "Butter Enchi Banana". We don't do multiple takes and my brain was scrambled with genetic names so I misspoke. Its actual ID is "Banana Enchi Leopard". But, as promised, here is our egg cutting video. Good things to come!
***EDIT 2***
Confused myself talking about Butter reducing freckling effect of Banana and completely neglected to mention that Enchi has the exact same effect, and that's where I went off the rails in my train of thought 🤣. Enchi reduces freckling just like genes from the BEL complex and a few other genes. Again, we don't do more than one take, so I may correct myself with these edits ... A lot.
Check in with us tonight for another "cutting" video. Had to run home on lunch and discovered a clutch pipping, so had to incise the eggs right then and there. We will still be doing a video to fully open them up, but these hatchlings weren't ready to wait on OUR schedule.😆
Good things to come!
Well, hi there!
A few pics from yesterday's egg cutting. Watching the video again, I can say with almost absolute certainty that we did hit the all-gene animal, a Pastel Banana Enchi Blade Clown. If it's male, it will be a female maker with how the banana gene works, and if it's female it will be even better! We are most definitely holding that one back, should it successfully emerge from the egg.
This entire clutch is full of absolute stunners, so really hoping for great news in the coming days as they begin to crawl out. Good things to come!
Egg cutting, clutch CL202302. Good things to come!
Welp, when it's not good news, that means it's bad news.
Most unfortunately, the clutch we just cut is toast. A couple of the babies had formed fairly well but never came out of the egg. The rest never formed properly from the git-go.
BUMMER.
It's a pretty swift kick to the groin, but as I've said before, if there's anything that the first season taught us, it's to expect literally anything and NEVER take your losses too hard. This loss is twofold, as it also means that we won't be breeding Kaya in the future. Since this was her second clutch to inexplicably go bad in consecutive years, we'd rather not risk continuing to breed her and stress her out for nothing. She's basically the morph that started this all, and she's a super sweet girl that we're just going to spoil as a pet now.
Yeah, we're not the kind of breeder that's just going to offload an animal when they become unproductive. Some people do, and there's nothing wrong with that especially if you're crunching numbers to maximize profit and rack space, but... We have a connection and a bond with every single animal in our collection (well, except for Vlad- he's an a**hole that wants to eat me, but I'm slowly calming him down 😂).
So with the bad news out of the way, we can move forward. We don't have any more bad news to share, and that's good news.
Just something from my personal philosophy that I'd like to share, is...
Life happens. It's good, it's bad, it's everywhere and everything in between. Sometimes it's all those things at once. Some things are well within your ability to control while others are completely uncontrollable no matter what. But, no matter what, there is ONE THING that you can ALWAYS control... and that one thing is, how YOU react to the good, the bad and the in between.
Don't spend too much time dwelling in darkness or it will consume you. But, when you find yourself having to endure dark times, shine bright.
Good things to come!
First egg cutting of 2023 from 2022 breeding season. Mixed emotions here, so we'll see how many come out of the egg over the next few days.
$150 of steel, some fabrication skill, 2 cans of satin black, 4 pilfered casters, 5 repurposed V70 tubs and 5 hours labor. Result, our new rodent breeding rack that we plan to use exclusively for ASF colonies.
There's some imperfection on a couple of the shelf levels that will ALWAYS drive me crazy, but overall we are pleased with the results. Good things to come!
Update video for those interested.
Stroud, OK
Be the first to know and let us send you an email when MetalHead Morphs posts news and promotions. Your email address will not be used for any other purpose, and you can unsubscribe at any time.
5 different females here from the same clutch. The variability and color contrast between them is just phenomenal!
An excellent example of the progression with stacking multiple genes. Blade Clown, Blade Enchi Clown and Blade Super Enchi Clown. Note the progressive pattern reduction, and the higher expression of orangish brown coloration as the stack increases. Enchi is still one of the coolest homozygous traits that have a major influence on Clown.
Hatchling introduction, from the clutch of 4 that was produced by Ignis and Rydia (Enchi Leopard Butter × Banana Champagne). This is the introduction I had forgotten about previously. All four will be available to go to new homes once they've proven to consistently eat.
Introductions to CL2303 and CL2302. Realized after filming that we haven't actually done an introductory video for the Ignis × Rydia clutch yet, so that will be happening soon after all.
Officially introducing the crown jewel of this hatching season, and our first holdback. We've named her "Rikku" and she's going to be an amazing addition to the MHM family. Banana Pastel Enchi Blade Clown.
Our first litter of ASF rats has hit the ground, faster than we expected. Good things to come!
Bittersweet. Final egg cutting video of this season. PLENTY of updates and excitement to come, though!
Correction before I get too far here: Final snake at the end, I accidentally said it's ID is "Butter Enchi Banana". We don't do multiple takes and my brain was scrambled with genetic names so I misspoke. Its actual ID is "Banana Enchi Leopard". But, as promised, here is our egg cutting video. Good things to come! ***EDIT 2*** Confused myself talking about Butter reducing freckling effect of Banana and completely neglected to mention that Enchi has the exact same effect, and that's where I went off the rails in my train of thought 🤣. Enchi reduces freckling just like genes from the BEL complex and a few other genes. Again, we don't do more than one take, so I may correct myself with these edits ... A lot.
Well, hi there!
Egg cutting, clutch CL202302. Good things to come!
First egg cutting of 2023 from 2022 breeding season. Mixed emotions here, so we'll see how many come out of the egg over the next few days.
Update video for those interested.
Short clip of removing the dame from her death grip on the clutch.
This is our reptile room assistant, Tiny. He "helps" during daily maintenance and checks, every single day. Don't know what we'd do without him. 🥰
For anyone interested, a more BASIC ball python genetics lesson. Realized we never gave an "entry level" lesson, so here it is as best as I can explain it. My apologies for not doing this sooner. It can get confusing and I've already spent about 3 years cramming my head full of this information on a daily basis, for hours a day.
Plans for this year's breeding season.
Update, as promised.
Hatchling introduction and genetics lesson!
