The Mojave Ball Python is one of the more commonly found morphs on the market. This is a color and pattern morph that has many subtle differences to a ‘wild type’ Ball Python. However, a Super Mojave Ball Python will produce an entirely different snake.
We will discuss more about the genetics of the Mojave morph below. This morph is commonly available and easy to produce, resulting in a modest price tag. You could expect to pay anywhere from $75 for a standard Mojave Ball Python.
Mojave Python Description
The Mojave Ball Python has various shades of browns, vibrant yellows, deep blacks, creamy highlights and flames. They also have a different pattern that makes them easy to distinguish.
Instead of having the typical “alien head” pattern that many normal ball pythons have, the Mojave’s pattern seems to be split in two and separated by intense amounts of flaming. This ‘flaming’ tends to rise from the underside of the snake.
The modified ‘alien heads’ on a Mojave Ball Python generally produces only one black dot inside. This is often compared to a ‘keyhole as opposed to an ‘alien head’. Another characteristic trait on the Mojave is a complete white underbelly.
The Super Mojave Ball Python is drastically different than a single gene Mojave. It is probably the best example to show just how spectacular co-dominant mutations can be.
The Super Mojave is a completely white snake with bright Blue Eyes. There are no remnants of patterning on the snake. They are known as the Blue Eyed Leucistic.
Sometimes they can have a pinkish hue to them while some can have paradox spots where a small group of scales have normal coloration.
Mojave Ball Python Genetics
The Mojave Ball Python is a co-dominant morph. This means that, like a dominant morph, you only need one Mojave to produce Mojave babies. However, if you breed two Mojave’s together, you will produce Super Mojave’s.
This morph will contain the genetic mutation in one of the alleles in their DNA sequence while a Super Mojave 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 all 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 Mojave Ball Pythons.
Mojave Ball Python x Normal Ball Python
The simplest way to produce a Mojave Ball Python is to pair a Mojave with a normal Ball Python. The resulting offspring will consist of 50% Mojave’s and 50% Normal Ball Pythons. This pairing will not create any Super Mojave’s or Blue Eyed Leucistics.
As you can see, there 4 possible outcomes. We have named 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 MN, MN, NN and NN. MN means that one of the alleles were Mojave while the other was normal. The NN outcome means that both genes were normal.
As the Mojave morph is a co-dominant mutation, only one of the alleles needs to hold the trait, for the offspring to be a Mojave. This means that the offspring will consist of 50% Mojave’s and 50% Normal Ball Pythons.
Mojave x Mojave
Another way to produce a Mojave is to pair a Mojave with another Mojave. The resulting offspring will consist of 50% Mojave Ball Pythons, 25% Normal Ball Pythons and 25% Super Mojave’s (known as a Blue Eyed Leucistic morph).
In this case, the 4 possible outcomes were MM, MN, MN and NN. MM occurred when both parents passed on the Mojave gene. As this mutation is co-dominant, this combination will result in a Super Mojave Ball Python (BEL).
This means that the offspring will consist of 50% Mojave, 25% Normal and 25% Super Mojave.
Super Mojave x Normal Ball Python
If you breed a Super Mojave to a Normal Ball Python, all of the offspring will be Mojave. This is because one of the parents will always pass the Mojave gene while the other parent will always pass the Normal gene. As a result, all of the offspring will be MN, i.e. one Mojave allele and one Normal allele.
Super Mojave x Super Mojave Ball Python
If you breed a Super Mojave to a Super Mojave Ball Python, all of the offspring will be Super Mojave (BEL). This is because both of the parents will always pass the Mojave gene. As a result, all of the offspring will be MM, i.e. both alleles will be Mojave.
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
Black Pastel 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
Orange Dream Ball Python Morph
Pied Ball Python Morph