Help with Sexing?

[Invisible Snake]

I agree with everyone else, it's male.

[Selkielass]

I'm thinking male.
looks a lot like Ziva at that size, but Ziva was way fatter, complicating the matter.

I began to suspect Ziva was male when I caught him sunning in a way that the light shone through his tail section, sorta like candling an egg or holding g documents over a light table.
The hemipene pocket area looked different than the muscle and bone of the rest of the tail- more similar to the guts in front of the vent.

With albinos back lighting can be very illuminating.

[ConcinusMan]

I didn't even think about that but yeah, with some young albinos and especially snows, you can actually see the hemipenes if you use a strong backlight and shine it through. This usually works best when they're around a year old, give or take a couple of months.

[Sherrie]

Thanks for the input everyone! My son is thrilled to know he doesn't have to change his snake's name! If it turned out to be female, she was going to be stuck with the name Morpheus. Lol. That's very interesting about using the backlight. Wish I had thought of that before. I am going to try it. I'll try to take some pics and if it works out I'll post them.

[Sherrie]

Ok. We tried the backlight thing. I wasn't able to get a pic. There's just too much glare with the bright light. There's a dark area at the vent, but it's only about a quarter inch long. Does that sound right for a male that's about 17 inches long or could that be female?

[ConcinusMan]

I don't what you're seeing but I'm still sure it's a male so male parts will be in the base of the tail. Sometimes you can see one on one side of the base and usually a smaller one on the other if enough light comes through and there's enough contrast. I wouldn't expect that you would be able to photograph it and it won't always work but you can try to look yourself.

I'm sticking with male regardless of what you see or don't see by using backlighting. There's a slight bulge after the cloaca and it doesn't taper right away. Female tail would be immediately narrower below the cloaca and shorter.

[Sherrie]

Ok. That's great! Thanks!