"people have been breeding morphs for decades now its not a new science...when you have an albino with yellow(like the ball python)it takes an axanthic to prduce a snow...when you have an albino with red(like a corn)then it takes an anery to produce a snow."
Quote from Joe above
Joe I think you just talked yourself into and verified the justification of the red-sided and plains anerys being called anerys and not melanistic right there. The red-sided albinos have tons of reds and oranges, and when you combine the ANERY gene, that red is completely gone in the resulting SNOW, clear evidence that the ANERY gene has taken the REDs (ery=red, anery=red taken away). I personally could be more on the fence with calling the plains or red-sided anery vs axanthic, since there is also yellows in addition taken away from the red-sided and plains albinos, but it is definately not a best fit to be called melanistic.
The eastern SNOW is not really a snow, if we use the strict definition of a snow is the combo of anery and albino, then it's a melanistic albino combo and part of the reason it is a "dirty" snow is that the Shuett albino is a "dirty" T+albino so it is not a completely melanine destroyed gene like the Iowa albino or the red-sided albino and the other reason is that the melanistic eastern gene wipes out the pattern so you see the dirty T+ albinos purplish/brownish smeared all over.
I think part of what makes these terms contriversial in the garter snake world and confuses us all is that these garter snake genes by appearance don't really fall tightly into the conventional corn snake categories, the garter axanthic/anery genes exibit a crisp black color which could just be just the result of stripping other brown making color pigments leaving only crisp black, (remember reds and greens mixed make brown) or could be the result of those other colors being stripped away AND an increase in melanin. Also garters may produce unique pigments that make greens and blues, that corns and balls have none of. One reason why garters are WAAAAAY more colorful, and have way more different colored morphs, species, subspecies, polymorphic traits, ect that any other snake on the planet.
It's going to be interesting to see what the eastern melanistic gene does in combination with a more wiped out melanin albino (likely T-) like the florida albino. My guess is that you will still see the solid pattern aspect of the melanistic gene in the florida albino melanistic, but that the melanistic gene will not strip or take away any of the yellow from the florida albino, so it will be a solid "dirty" yellowish snake rather than the "dirty" purplish/brownish of the Schuett albino melanistic, and maybe neither snake really desirves to be called a snow, but what we call any of these genes or gene combos, its all symantics really anyway IMHO and either way I think we should just respect the initial call of the person that had the right and priveledge to name them in the first place and just stick with it, it's just easier that way.
You say eether and I say eyether,
You say neether and I say nyther;
Eether, eyether, neether, nyther,
Let's call the whole thing off!
You like potato and I like potahto,
You like tomato and I like tomahto;
Potato, potahto, tomato, tomahto!
Let's call the whole thing off!