Thursday, January 4

Pictures of our new Striped House Snakes (Lamprophis lineatus)

These are different then the L. Capensis with a genetic stripe trait I posted shots of before.

These three lovely animals are Lamprophis lineatus from the Kilamanjaro area of Tanzania (commonly known as the striped house snake) and were just shipped to me by Nick Mole of FCR Reptiles. Nick was extremely helpful with answering my questions and handling a shipping change I had to make. The animals were what was promised, (all sub adults over 2 feet) in great health. One has a moderate wound which is common with imports, especially wild caught.

If you are looking for some of your own Nick has not only these but some Pastel House Snakes and some other less common stuff from South Africa just in including wolf snakes and Rufus Beak Snakes. You can see his Kingsnake.com Ad for more details.

So here are my two new girls and new female. With the size of these guys I should be breeding the bigger female by August at the latest.

First the smaller female. As you can see she has the eye line to body pattern breaks that are common in L. capensis but unlike the striped capensis I posted pictures of earlier the line on the side is solid vs. the chain pattern on the recessive trait in L. capensis.



Here is another shot of the same snake as you can see while quite thin as most young house snakes are she is quite long (there is a good foot of her coiled in my hand where you can see it) and the stripe is very vivid and beautiful. They also have eyes that are more "bug eyed" similar to Nambian House Snakes.



Next is the larger female. As you can see they all have a nice red brown shine to them, this shot shows it off best. She is a lot heavier bodied then the male and smaller female. She should put weight on quickly and size and be ready to breed late summer to early fall.



Again another shot of here showing the nice red colartion, the bright white solid striping which you can see transfers to a cream color as it decends down her body.



Last is a single shot if the male, he was the most flighty so I did not want to keep him out to long before letting him settle in. While not the best shot it does show a pretty good idea of the nice color they have and the way the line fades as it decends the body.



Again if you are looking for these I suggest you get in touch with Nick Mole at FCR Reptiles who can be reached at fcreptilesinc @ yahoo.com. Between Don at Mefezi and Nick at FCR it looks like we are strarting to see some less common Lamprophis come into the US.

These are a great addition to my colony here. We are working hard to develop one of the best collections of House Snakes and this was something I have been wanting to add for a long time. I am not sure how many Nick has but again don't expect to see them every other day,

Jack Spirko

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