The Black Pastel Ball Python Morph is less popular than some of the other Ball Python morphs. However, it is still an important gene for many breeders and has been used extensively since it was first proven in 2002 by Gulf Coast Reptiles. It is a co-dominant mutation. This is similar to a dominant mutation, only that there is a Super form of the Black Pastel if two of the alleles contain the mutation.
We will discuss more about the genetics of a Black Pastel below. This morph is commonly available and easy to produce, resulting in a modest price tag. You could expect to pay anywhere from $100 for a standard Black Pastel while Super Black Pastels start at a few hundred dollars.
Black Pastel Ball Python Description
The Black Pastel Ball Python morph is very similar to the Cinnamon morph. However, this is a separate lineage of genetics. A Black Pastel Ball Python looks similar to a normal Ball Python but they have more contrast.
This contrast is largely due to their distinctive dark background colouration. Their pattern colouration is also slightly different in colouration to a normal, and has been described as having a gold or rusty colouration.
The Super form of the Black Pastel is a stunning animal. These morphs are almost entirely jet black. Some of the morphs produced using this gene has created some stunning animals.
The Panda Pied is a combination of Super Black Pastel and Pied. These animals are completely white with Black spots. Most Panda Pieds are ‘high white’ Pieds, meaning that most of the snake is white as opposed to the background colour.
Black Pastel Ball Python History
Gulf Coast Reptiles are credited with making the first Black Pastel. Interestingly, the Cinnamon Ball Python, which is very similar to the Black Pastel was first produced around the same time.
Greg Graziani is credited with producing the first Cinnamon in 2002. What makes this more interesting is that these two very similar morphs were first produced only about an hour’s drive from each other.
This led to scepticism as to whether they were different morphs. It wasn’t until different combos were produced that you were really able to see the difference between these morphs.
Black Pastel Ball Python Genetics
The Black Pastel Ball Python is a co-dominant morph. This means that, like a dominant morph, you only need one Black Pastel to produce Black Pastel babies. However, if you breed two Black Pastel together, you will produce Super Black Pastels.
A Black Pastel will contain the genetic mutation in one of the alleles in their DNA sequence while a Super Black Pastel will contain the genetic mutation in both of the alleles. The appearance of these two snakes is visibly different, which distinguishes the co-dominant mutation from a dominant mutation.
How are genetics passed on in Ball Pythons
We are not going to go into too much detail about how genetics work in snakes in this article. We have explained it in detail in our Recessive Ball Python Morphs article. Make sure you check that out if you are not familiar about how genetic mutations are passed.
While the article discusses recessive Ball Pythons, the concept of how parents pass on their genetics is the same for co-dominant morphs, the appearance of the offspring is just different.
Here is a basic breakdown of a DNA strand:
Locus – This is the location of a gene/allele on a DNA strand.
Allele – Genes are made up of pairs of Alleles. Therefore an allele is a single gene on a given locus.
The image above shows a DNA strand of two snakes. Let’s say, they are a Normal and Pied Ball Python. Let’s say the first locus on this DNA strand is for the Pied Gene. You can see that the first snake has 2 normal genes (not Pied) while the second snake has two Pied genes (visible Pied).
When these snakes reproduce, they will each pass on one of their Alleles from each locus to their offspring. This means that the offspring will receive one of their ‘Pied’ genes from their mother and one from their father.
We will use this concept to explain how different pairings will produce Black Pastels.
Black Pastel x Normal Ball Python
The simplest way to produce a Black Pastel Ball Python is to pair a Black Pastel with a normal ball python. The resulting offspring will consist of 50% Black Pastels and 50% Normal Ball Pythons. This pairing will not create any Super Black Pastels.
As you can see, there 4 possible outcomes. We have names each allele and colour coded them. As each parent can only pass one gene each, the possible outcomes are 1-3, 1-4, 2-3 and 2-4. Alleles 1-2 cannot both be passed, either can 3-4 as this would mean a single parent passed on both of the genes.
So the 4 possible outcomes were BN, BN, NN and NN. BN means that one of the alleles were Black Pastel while the other was normal. The NN outcome means that both genes were normal.
As a Black Pastel Ball Python is a co-dominant mutation, only one of the alleles needs to hold the trait, for the offspring to be a Black Pastel. This means that the offspring will consist of 50% Black Pastels and 50% Normal Ball Pythons.
Black Pastel x Black Pastel
Another way to produce a Black Pastel Ball Python is to pair a Black Pastel with another Black Pastel. The resulting offspring will consist of 50% Black Pastels and 25% Normal Ball Pythons and 25% Super Black Pastels.
In this case, the 4 possible outcomes were BB, BN, BN and NN. BB occurred when both parents passed on the Black Pastel gene. As this mutation is co-dominant, this combination will result in a Super Black Pastel.
This means that the offspring will consist of 50% Black Pastel, 25% Normal and 25% Super Black Pastel.
Super Black Pastel x Normal Ball Python
If you breed a Super Black Pastel to a Normal Ball Python, all of the offspring will be Black Pastel. This is because one of the parents will always pass the Black Pastel gene while the other parent will always pass the Normal gene. As a result, all of the offspring will be BN, i.e. one Black Pastel allele and one Normal allele.
Super Black Pastel x Super Black Pastel Ball Python
If you breed a Super Black Pastel to a Super Black Pastel, all of the offspring will be Super Black Pastel. This is because both of the parents will always pass the Black Pastel gene. As a result, all of the offspring will be BB, i.e. both alleles will be Black Pastel.
Other Ball Python Morph Guides
We have a wide range of Ball Python Morph guides. You can check some of them out here:
Albino Ball Python Morph
Banana Ball Python Morph
Blue Eyed Leucistic Ball Python Morph
Butter Ball Python Morph
Champagne Ball Python Morph
Chocolate Ball Python Morph
Cinnamon Ball Python Morph
Enchi Ball Python Morph
Fire Ball Python Morph
GHI Ball Python Morph
Mojave Ball Python Morph
Orange Dream Ball Python Morph
Pied Ball Python Morph
