T.h.h. leucistica! Gorgeous!

[jkingler]

I am generally not a fan of blondes, but these are exceptions...

http://testudohermannihermannileucistica.com/default.asp?Lingua=Inglese

Leucistic hermannis...Who knew? Simply breathtaking.

Does anyone have one? And any idea what they would go for? Probably too rich for my blood, but a boy can dream...

 

[Jacob]

Those Are Beautiful, I would Love To Have One.

 

[GBtortoises]

Last (and only) one I've ever been aware of in the U.S. was for sale for $5,000.00. That was about 3 years ago. As with most animals, tortoises included, several color variants can be found in the wild including melanistic, albino and more.

 

[jkingler]

5k, eh? Sounds about right, sadly. A dream it is and a dream it shall likely remain!

^So pretty!
Any pictures of melanistic hermanni? I love darker looking torts, e.g. Black Greeks, and especially the darker individual t.h.h. I have seen, but I am not sure I've seen any full-on melanistic hermanni.

 

[bubbles01]

Now I am getting a bit freaked out here......

Daisy, who was brought to me last year with a huge hole in the back of her shell looks just like this, I just thought she had very few markings..... The brown on the pictures here is darker on her... but now I'm starting to wonder... I am getting the camera out as we speak, will put some pics up shortly... she cant be... surely.

---

This has actually got me thinking, when I first joined TFO I put pics up of my then 4 torts and EgyptianDan ID'd them all for me. I have since lost one and gained four so those have never been properly identified by TFO members.

Niles is so obviously the same as Bella I dont wonder about him, but Oscar's shell is a different shape - rather than hijacking here though I will put up a new thread with pics to get others to have a look

Pictures of Daisy as promised.. She is not the most beautiful tort in the world because of her injury - but you will see what I mean about the lack of markings..

 

[GBtortoises]

Now I am getting a bit freaked out here......

Daisy, who was brought to me last year with a huge hole in the back of her shell looks just like this, I just thought she had very few markings..... The brown on the pictures here is darker on her... but now I'm starting to wonder... I am getting the camera out as we speak, will put some pics up shortly... she cant be... surely.

---

This has actually got me thinking, when I first joined TFO I put pics up of my then 4 torts and EgyptianDan ID'd them all for me. I have since lost one and gained four so those have never been properly identified by TFO members.

Niles is so obviously the same as Bella I dont wonder about him, but Oscar's shell is a different shape - rather than hijacking here though I will put up a new thread with pics to get others to have a look

Pictures of Daisy as promised.. She is not the most beautiful tort in the world because of her injury - but you will see what I mean about the lack of markings..

Eastern Hermann's, which is what your's in the photo is, come a never ending variation of color contrast, shapes and adults sizes depending upon on the geographical areas and populations that they are from in the wild. Some are darker, some are lighter, some have much more black, some have much more yellow and so on. The tortoise in your photo looks to be a very old wild caught adult. If it could be bred with another adult known to be wild caught with the same traits you would most likely get offspring with those same traits. But over the past almost 6 decades and several generations most Eastern Hermann's have simply been bred with other Eastern Hermann's. Not taking into account their geographical origin. So now the majority of Easterns in captivity exhibit much more similar traits with one another than their original wild caught ancestors did. As with any animals, there are more dominant genetic features that still prevail even after a few generations of captive breeding. This is why there is still some variation with color and contrast (although little) and some difference in shape and overall size. But all of those features are far less different from each other in captivity than they originally were.
I would be very interested in seeing your newer Hermann's. If you can see a very noticeable difference in size and other features there is a good chance that they may be Dalmatian Hermann's and not Easterns.

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5k, eh? Sounds about right, sadly. A dream it is and a dream it shall likely remain!

^So pretty!
Any pictures of melanistic hermanni? I love darker looking torts, e.g. Black Greeks, and especially the darker individual t.h.h. I have seen, but I am not sure I've seen any full-on melanistic hermanni.

The German author, Wolfgang Wegehaupt has some excellent photos of various patterns and colorations of Eastern Hermann's and the other subspecies in his book: "Naturalistic Keeping and Breeding of Hermann's Tortoises.

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My mistake! The $5,000 price that I had seen 3 years ago for a leucistic Hermann's was for an Eastern, not a Western Hermann's. That being the case you can probably assume that the asking price for a leucistic Western here in the U.S. would probably be more like $12,000-15,000!

None are worth that much to me that's for sure!

 

[ALDABRAMAN]

 

[jkingler]

They are amazing, but yeesh, definitely not worth even 5k to me, let alone 12-15!

It would be awesome if you were breeding and those recessive genes were expressed in your hatchlings though, eh? That would have to be a stupefying surprise, but also an extremely unlikely happening!

 

[l0velesly]

Wow, really nice color!

 

[GBtortoises]

If you like those check out: www.testudoalbino.com

You'll have to use google translate or other site or just check out the cool pictures!

 

[jkingler]

Whoa! Caramel marginated???

http://translate.googleusercontent....o.html&usg=ALkJrhgjv1S2LuWMpybLOaYrOgr8dj2R1Q

http://translate.googleusercontent....a.html&usg=ALkJrhgfzNPgvCUDJ9L90nsIiCiFn69rPg

Price only told by voice...meaning like 20k? Haha.

 

[Tccarolina]

Wow! !