iHerp_Australia_-_March-April_2018

Morph it or leave it:

in defence of unnatural selection.

Andy Horlor is the vice president of the Illawarra Reptile Society

and owner of Fuzzy Fox Reptiles and Rodents that specializes

in breeding pythons, monitors and rodents. But what made a

diehard purist become mad about morphs?

I

have seen many changes in the reptile hobby over

the years, but the one that sticks out in my mind

more than any other was the introduction of morphs.

As the first morphs began to enter the Australian

market, it became clear that the hobby was becoming

divided; you either loved the ‘new and improved’

animals or you were more than happy with the colour

forms that evolution had blessed us with. I was to be

found in the latter group – the ‘purists’. Like many

others in this camp, my mind was made up; no one

should be altering our native animals in such dramatic

fashion. The mere thought of putting two different

subspecies together for breeding purposes would send

me into a cold sweat!

For nearly 10 years I looked at morphs as nothing more

than monstrosities and scoffed with self-righteous

disbelief whenever I heard the word ‘Jag’ mentioned

aloud. However, about eight years ago that was all

about to change, and by crikey change it did! Today my

collection consists of over 100 animals and about two-

thirds of them are morphs.

So what happened? How could someone that was

completely devoted to the keeping and breeding of

animals that needed to be found under the same rock in

order to be paired and bred together become so

comprehensively converted? Allow me to set the

stage....

One day I had a clutch of Diamond Pythons (Morelia

spilota spilota) hatching; these were Gosford locality

animals and I was excitedly setting them up in their new

tubs. I looked through the clutch and found one I liked. I

placed it in the first tub in the rack as a ‘keeper’ and

proceeded to do the same with two more individuals.

Then I started to think about what I had done - how I

had ‘selected’ what I deemed to be the best out of the

clutch. This began a compounding thought process as I

Left: Axanthic Jaguar Carpet Python.

All images by Andy Horlor.

5