Lavender Hognoses

The western hognose (Heterodon nasicus) Lavender gene is a simple recessive that strips the normal pattern of its warm browns and blacks and replaces them with a cool, pale lavender-to-purple cast. It reads less like a colour added than a colour removed, and keepers buy it for the washed, almost pastel look that no other western hognose gene produces on its own.

Appearance

An adult Lavender carries a soft purple-grey to purple-pink base where a normal snake would show tan, olive or rust brown, and the saddle blotches running down the back come through as a darker lavender or brownish-purple rather than true black. The single most reliable tell is the eyes and tongue: both stay a dark, dusky purple rather than turning pink or red, because Lavender reduces melanin rather than removing it outright, which is why keepers file it as a T+ type rather than a true albino. Pattern contrast tends to read more strongly on younger animals and softens somewhat as the snake matures. Exactly how warm or cool the wash comes out varies animal to animal, from a grey-leaning cast to a pinker one, which is part of why the gene photographs inconsistently.

Genetics

Lavender is inherited as a simple recessive, at a locus independent of Axanthic, so the two combine without either masking the other. The family carries the usual recessive scaffolding: Het Lavender, 50% Het Lavender and 66% Het Lavender mark carriers whose het status comes from a parent's known genotype or from clutch odds, and Pos Het Lavender marks an unconfirmed carrier bred from a het parent without proof breeding. None of the four het designations carries a visual tell, so a het Lavender looks like a normal hognose. Paired with Albino, Lavender produces the combination the trade calls Coral. No originator or first-produced date for the gene is reliably documented.