Desert Western Hognose

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Description of the Desert Morph
Desert is a recessive color mutation that reduces and suppresses warm pigments (reds, oranges, yellows, and peach) and lightens the overall coloration. It appears to leave the melanin intact. By lightening the background color, it increases the contrast of the saddles and lateral blotches versus the background color. It does not appear to affect the shape or location of the pattern, but the blotches of pattern appear to be lighter, faded, and softer around the edges. This can be attributed to the reduction or loss of the warm pigments that are a component of the richness of color of a normal hognose snake.

Upon hatching they are very easy to identify as they have an overall dark silvery/blue to ash/gray color. They display very little to no warm pigments from day one. As they age, the saddles lighten up to become an overall sandy gray/beige color. The background color lightens to a pale, creamy gray/white. Adult Deserts are a cool-toned, sandy brown/gray (brown softened with gray) color, with greatly reduced warm red or orange tones. Their color is not rich brown like a Normal, or gray like an Axanthic. Instead, they develop a soft, cool-toned, stone-washed look. Their colors are muted, and desaturated, giving them a desert-stone look with no warm tones. They can retain warm pigments on the belly and can have some light yellow or light orange on the ventral scales. However, the saturation of this yellow or orange on the ventral scales is greatly reduced.

Scientific Interpretation of the Desert Morph
Color formation in Western Hognose is controlled by four pigment cell types: melanophores (produce black and brown melanin), xanthophores and erythrophores (produce warm pigments like yellow, orange, and red, and warm browns through pigment mixing), and iridophores (reflect light to add blue, gray and structural sheen). Desert appears to affect only the warm pigments, which suggests it is disrupting xanthophore and erythrophore development or pigment production, and does not affect melanin or iridophores. It is possible that the Desert gene may cause a reduction of the number of xanthophores and erythrophores formed during development, or it may inhibit the functionality of these pigment cell types to reduce or mute the warm pigments from being produced.

Deserts lack warm tones on the top of their body but can retain some light yellow or light orange on their bellies. However, in all cases, the amount of yellow or orange on the belly is reduced compared to Normals.

Origin of the Desert Gene
The Desert gene traces back to a bloodline of Normal Western Hognose originally produced by longtime Southern California breeder Randy Wright, who has since retired from snake breeding. Years ago, Randy was working with two Normal females that were both paired to the same male. He described that male as “super clean and light, with almost no black patterning.” Although we requested photos, the male had already been sold during the downsizing of his collection, so we were never able to see him ourselves.

We purchased several pairs of normal offspring from the “super clean and light” male and Normal females from Randy. Most of these snakes were used in some outcrosses to strengthen our existing recessive projects, particularly Axanthic. However, one of the pairs was bred together, and from that pairing we produced our very first Desert.

We held back that original Desert and repeated the pairing the following season. Production from the female was limited that year, so we were unable to produce additional Deserts from that specific pairing. Even so, the initial animal gave us the foundation we needed to begin proving the gene.

A few years after hatching the first Desert, we produced an exceptional Axanthic Conda male from an Axanthic Conda × Anaconda Het Axanthic pairing (male pictured below, as a baby and adult). This male had an unusually sharp, distinctive appearance. It was different enough that we suspected he might be expressing the Desert gene, even though neither parent was known to be directly connected to the project.

To test this, we paired him to a female we knew was Het Desert. The results were unmistakable: roughly half the clutch expressed Desert. This confirmed that the Axanthic Conda male was a Axanthic Desert Conda, and it marked a big step forward in proving the gene was recessive and understanding how it expresses across different combinations.

Finding Desert unexpectedly in this Axanthic Conda strongly supports our theory that the original Randy Wright bloodline was the source of the Desert gene, since the snakes from this bloodline (used as outcrosses in our Axanthic projects) had quietly carried it into some projects over the years. Because we never saw the original sire, we cannot say with certainty whether he visually expressed the Desert trait. His description certainly aligns with the clean, light-colored look we now associate with Desert. After so many years, the original male cannot be traced, so this part of the story will remain a mystery behind the Desert line.

Desert Combination Morphs
As of 2025 production, our goals for the Desert project were to prove out the gene and understand its inheritance and make enough that we had some to start offering to the public. We are still in the early stages of exploring this gene and haven’t yet taken it through all the possible combinations with other recessive traits. This project was discovered in one of our Axanthic (with Conda) projects, so we have hatched Desert Condas, Desert Super Condas, Axanthic Deserts, and Axanthic Desert Condas. We have some ideas on great projects that can be created using the Desert gene, and plan to work it into other projects in the future. 

We have found the Desert gene works well to enhance Axanthic. Axanthics on their own can still express some red pigment (erythrophores), which can lead some to develop a brown tone as they mature. The Axanthic Desert combination is very clean and crisp black/white/gray, and we have not observed any brown on the examples we have hatched to date.