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Pyrrho pride parade.

Azhael

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It´s that time of the year (apparently) and i just can´t believe how good the pyrrhos are looking this time. I moved them into a larger tank very recently and they seem to have apreciated it because since then the males have gone into full mode, their colours have just exploded. I´m amazed...trully...i´m spending a ridiculous amount of time staring at them...
I never thought i´d like this species so much when i first got them as metamorphs. I knew i´d like them and that they got prettier but i wasn´t prepared to have my brain bombarded with this crazy mixture of colours :S In real life they are just incredible...

Aaargh...i love this hobby.....
 

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Azhael

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A couple more and one of the females, because they are brilliant too :D
 

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Kaysie

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Are your boys lifting weights? That first picture, that dude's totally got a 'beefcake' neck.
 

Bellabelloo

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Fantastic photo's. I visited Eva and her Pyrrho's a little while ago and was amazed how stunning the males are. The females looked like little barrels :D. I am really looking forward to my little group maturing now.
 

Molch

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awesome pics. My pyrrhs are looking good too. I will hibernate them in the cold room soon in hopes to get them up and at it in spring. :)
 

Molch

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You live in Alaska. Aren't they all cold???

:bowl::D Hon, we DO have heaters here in Winterfell. Now that I have electricity, I can even have a heater with a thermostat. My place is now warm and snug when I come home from work. I'm gonna end up getting all soft and wimpy like you folks down there in the tropics..;) :kiss:
 

Azhael

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Thanx everyone, they feel flattered :D
Eva, indeed they do, it´s such a fantastic species!
Do feel free to add some pictures of your own, pyrrho keepers out there, let´s make this a celebratory post about this awesome newts :) It´s not like we can ever have too many pictures of newts, let´s not kid ourselves...

Kaysie, courting like a complete mental must at some point fortify your neck muscles, right?. I suposse they must be full of testosterone too...not that they stand a chance against the females, they are huge.

Edit: I just witnessed one of the females picking up a spermatophore from the most flamboyant of the males. Sexual selection, people, live xD

PS: Sorry for the dirty glass, you´d think i could keep a new tank clean....
 

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Azhael

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:bowl::D Hon, we DO have heaters here in Winterfell.
I have half a mind to start calling you Molch Stark from now on :p It would make me a pitiful nerd (the kind that lives in his parent´s basement at 40) but dammit it´s cool to imagine you on The Wall :D
Don´t think newts will win you Westeros, though...
And now, my transformation into nerd level 20 is complete.
 

Molch

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I have half a mind to start calling you Molch Stark from now on :p It would make me a pitiful nerd (the kind that lives in his parent´s basement at 40) but dammit it´s cool to imagine you on The Wall :D
Don´t think newts will win you Westeros, though...
And now, my transformation into nerd level 20 is complete.

I thought about it, but really I'm not from Winterfell; I'm from further north, beyond the Wall from the coast of the Frozen Sea.

Winterfell with its lush boreal forests sound downright southern compared to our bare Arctic tundra...

so...does that make me one of the White Walkers?

nerds rule! remember: the Geek will inherit the earth
 

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AngieD

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I was wondering if 2 of my boyfriend's newts were pyrros, after looking at your pictures I think his must be hybridised with chinese fire-bellies
 

Molch

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I was wondering if 2 of my boyfriend's newts were pyrros, after looking at your pictures I think his must be hybridised with chinese fire-bellies

huh - I'm not sure Japanese (Cynops pyrrhogaster) and chinese firebellies (Hypselotriton orientalis) CAN hybridize - they are different genuses. There are other Cynops/Hypselotriton species as well. Can you post a pic of these newts?
 

eljorgo

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The newts can pretty much easily hybridize and much probably produce fertile descendents since they were from same genus previously and from all Salamandridae family they are from the closest genus (Hypselotriton/Cynops) not to mention they were all Cynops from a load of time.
BTW, there were multiple hybridizations that took action in the past. I can recall of Ommatotriton x Triturus, Mesotriton x Triturus x Lissotriton and Tylototriton x Pleurodeles among a few more. All produced living adults but i'm guessing most of these were infertile.
Offcourse not all combinations are possible and it was only possible due to similar breeding behaviors.

Most likely your boyfriends' animals to be some other morph of pyrrohgaster since there are many... Im thinking Kanto...
Cheers,
 

Azhael

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Being from different genera is not necessarily indicative of reproductive incompatibility. It´s difficult to get used to that reality xD The first time i heard of Pantherophis x Lampropeltis i honestly thought it was a joke.

It is entirely irrelevant in this case that they were placed in the same genus for a long time. That happened because of the cluster movement that followed a rather special concept of species. The same movement was responsible for the former Triturus and plenty of other messes in lizards and snakes. That classification had virtually no phylogenetic value. In this case, saying they are close because at one time they shared a genus is like saying that Hemorrhois hippocrepis is closely related to Coluber constrictor because they used to share a genus. Sure, Cynops /Hypselotriton are very close, but it has nothing to do with their former classification, because at some point they were all included in Triturus, even.. and that tells you nothing.
I have to disagree that such things were possible only through similar breeding behaviours, because that´s just a pre-zygotic mechanism and all non-amplexing newts (for example) have extremely similar courting behaviours. Plus, is it known in those experiements if the process ocurred "naturally" (i.e. the female chose and picked the spermatophore herself)?
The truth is that they are only possible because the mechanisms of genetic regulation are conserved and virtually the same and because of a lack of specific mechanisms that could have appeared to prevent it.

I´d be hugely interested to know if the hybrids mentioned produced fertile offspring or not and why. It would be such a fascinating thing to look at (in a lab, obviously).
What happened to the orientalis/pyrrhogaster hybrids that Jen had, do we know if those were fertile?

Angie, i doubt your boyfriend´s animals are hybrids, most likely they are not, post pictures if you can, though.


I´m afraid you are right, Molch, you are too far north to be in Winterfell, but let´s just assume winter came and it was pissed. Otherwise i can´t call you Molch Stark, and it´s just too good a name...and shiny!
 
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eljorgo

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I'm assuming they were breed only through similar breeding behaviors. Since all hybrids were managed from species that had same breeding behaviors exclusively. As far as I've seen none took place with animals with different courting behaviors.. Lets say, Chioglossa x Triturus or even Salamandra x Triturus.. Its impossible these to get together when they have astonishingly different breeding patterns..Since the female animals did receive the male sperm directly with no human intervention. Its sad there are no pictures or more info on this subject. These reports are all in the web but still very cloudy and not truly concise.
 

Azhael

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Well, yes, the hybrids are all between non-amplexing species or between amplexing ones, so it´s likely the fertilization ocurred spontaneously, but it´s not certain. The point i was making is, it doesn´t matter. Wether the courting behaviour is almost identical or very different, what matters is the genetics. You can have virtually identical breeding behaviours between two species and yet, hybridisation may be impossible, and you can have two species with very specific and distinctive breeding behaviours and they may be genetically compatible.
Chioglossa x Triturus or Salamandra x T. would in theory be completely impossible, but it´s not because of their habits or their differences in courting behaviour, it´s because they are distant enough that a successful zygote could not be formed.
Pre-zygotic mechanisms may impede or desuade hybridisation in the wild, but they don´t imply a genetic incompatibility, and the genetics are the stuff that really matter when it comes to trying to make an embryo.

I wish there was more information about these hybrids, they raise all sorts of fascinating questions.

Anyway, people, show your pyrrhos!
 

evut

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Here's some recent photos of my group:
 

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AngieD

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Thanks for the replies. I thought the pair were hybrids because they look very much like a half-way point between orientalis and pyrrhogaster. (They had pointed tails, rougher skin and a bit of a different body shape from the chinese fbs, and Pyro went faintly spotty quite recently)
I can't figure out how to post pictures because the web address thing is just confusing, I'll try to put them in my gallery instead.
And on the genus & hybrids front - 'Motty' the elephant from Chester Zoo was Elephas maximus X Loxodonta africana - people thought it was impossible until it happened.
 

Azhael

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Jesus, the female in the first picture is going to burst!
They are looking fantastic, Eva :)

Angie, maybe they simply are pyrrhogaster out of breeding season. Uploading pictures using the forum´s system is quite easy. Just click the "manage attachments" button, select the pictures from your computer and click upload, they will appear automatically attached to the thread.
 
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