#pseudomelanism

[asqadia-banthen]

naptime!

[thiswildcuriosity]

Spotted zebras, rock art, and doing science from your living room - Three Things I'm Curious About This Week.

[snkrfnd]

Rare polka-dotted zebra foal photographed in Kenya

[six-legged-sea-leopard]

should i start megposting again

[tysonfurybattlepass]

quick doodle of pseudo-melanism in a megantereon nihowanensis.

these lesser-known true sabertoothed cats are thought to be the only arboreally mobile genus within the taxon. they are known for their exceptionally large forearms relative to body size and their mandibular phalange, a trait not seen often in true sabertoothed cats. megantereon is also thought to possibly be an ancestor to the more derived smilodon genus. the reference photo i used was of a leopard, with cranial anatomy edited to more accurately resemble the megantereon taxon.

thanks @b0chelly for the suggestion!

[ntls-24722]

Zebraman stripe variations!

the strip between the upper lip and nose is bare skin, just like in cows, so that's why it's the same color as the lips, where the only determining factor in their color is melanin, so it's either pink or black, same goes for their tongues.

I don't think eye color has any evolutionary reason?...so I picked a range of colors with some emphasis on yellow eyes since they're present in the quagga-elves. Insular(pink-red) zebramen have more eye diversity in their eye color, but mainland Zebramen (black-brown) have darker irises to better blend in with their stripes. Insular zebramen aren't as predated as mainland zebramen, and alongside interbreeding with zebraelves, mainland zebramen have ended up with more prominent black-and-white stripes for the dazzle camouflage, while insular zebramen got to look super pretty with pinks and reds.

There's also these mutations!... 3 mutations.

The golden striped one was supposed to be a mutation the same way golden tigers have that mutation, but I think it would be a really common stripe color among mixed insular-mainland zebramen where they have that balance of eumelanin and pheomelanin to give them that color.

Then there's the "????" and the pseudomelanin ones, which might be one and the same?? I based off "????" off of tira but I couldn't conclusively get whether or not it was pseudomelanism or not in her case.

And there's even more mutations, which I felt it was better to use little fullbodies for.

For 1 and 2, sometimes zebramen's stripes get lazy and just stop below halfway to their torsos, and sometimes they get swaths of brown on their backs. Both are basal traits that sometimes pop up from their quagga-elf ancestors.

There's piebaldism, which is pretty self-explanatory, where the stripes just have a hole in them, but then there's the cases where there's barely stripes at all.

A form of melanism in zebramen is when the stripes just go way too crazy to the point they're just no longer stripes! just this big peppered black on their backs! And sometimes zebramen don't get the memo to make zebra stripes at all, and just have spots.

I should definitely expand on ethnicities and mutations like this for Debu, but man is it fun making this for zebramen cuz i get to mess with those stripes

[amber-tortoiseshell]

I'm a bit confused regarding abundism. Is regular blotched tabby considered abundism? Or any tabby with very wide markings? And if you know, how does the king cheetah fit into all this?

I think abundism doesn't have such a pinned down definition we'd need to answer these questions objectively.

According to wikipedia: "Pseudomelanism, also called abundism, is another variant of pigmentation, identifiable by dark spots or enlarged stripes, which cover a large part of the body of the animal, making it appear melanistic." They use a king cheetah to illustrate pseudomelanism. Since king cheetahs have a mutation on the same gene (Taqpep) as blotched tabbies, this suggests both are abundistic.

Messybeast contradicts itself: it equates king cheetah with abundism here ("The king cheetah is a mutant form of cheetah. This may be a form of abundism where spots coalesce into swirls."), but presents them as different variants here:

So in the end: I believe blotched tabby and king cheetah both can be considered abundism.

However, personally I think it's more useful the reserve the term for "the same pattern but more dense" rather than "a different pattern with larger black areas". And even then I think abundism is probably a scale. There are more and less abundistic individuals, and standard blotched tabbies and king cheetahs are on the lower end of the scale. It depends on personal preferences whether you'd call that abundism or only use this name for darker phenotypes.

[kitzuukts]

wof scale color headcanons fuck canon yeahhh

All tribes under the cut if I did it right

NightWings - any hue as long as it's dark. NightWings consider darker scales to be prettier and pitch-black is seen as mysterious and aristocratic. The "silver" scales on the wings and trailing down the neck etc can be pastel colors or even iridescent. Some NightWings with distant SeaWing blood have glowing silver scales. Prophets also have a "third eye" silver scale, similar to mind reader's teardrops. Their scales have near invisible markings like panthers and black cats, such as stripes and rosettes. They also rust in the daylight like cats do!

SandWings can be a much wider range of sandy colors, from white to tan to yellow to brown to oranges and pinks even, orangey reds and some blacks. They tend to have patterns that are fractal-like or repeating rather than random splotches and such. The keratin on their stinger is the same color as their claws and horns. SandWings with more symmetrical patterns are considered prettier.

LeafWings typically come in greens, but also browns, golds, yellows, oranges, reds, and sometimes blues and even the rare purple. Like albino plants, albino LeafWings struggle to get nutrients as they can't produce chloroform, so if they don't have strong enough leafspeak they die pretty young. Summer born LeafWings have richer, more vibrant hues, autumnal ones are brighter and often have gold patches or patterns, winter makes scales cooler toned and duller colored, and spring makes lighter and shinier scales. LeafWings have a beauty standard of larger, healthier scales, regardless of color.

IceWings can be any off-white or silvery color, with slight darker markings and some vibrant cooler tones. Their scales have a natural shine, and lighter, even opalescent scales are the beauty standard. Commoners have brown and grey scales sometimes but these are definitely considered a mark of the poor. Another strived for marking is striations of any kind, especially those that are warm-toned or opalescent.

MudWings can be any brown, from deep red to planty green, light to dark and dull to vibrant. Potentially from proximity to SeaWings and distant blood, some MudWings have a "rusted" look of having warm base colors and markings fading to greens and blues. MudWings are the most common to be albino, leustic, piebald, or melanistic. Albino MudWings are white and pink, while leustics are white and yellowy- orange. They can also be shades of grey and occassionally black, and beauty standard is defined by the amount and appeal of the gold scales found on all MudWings.

SkyWings can be any warm color, typically red to orange, but also vibrant pink and magenta, rarely yellow, and even more rarely purple, usually only seen in the royal family. Brighter scales indicate more time outside and health, and though they can't be shiny or iridescent they love inlaying gems to create that effect. Blue scales are rumored to be a telltale sign of firescales, and though all firescales have blue scales, not all blue is firescales. Beauty standard prefers richer, darker colors, and watery or lighter shades are seen as weaker.

SeaWings can be So Many Colors. You usually find the blues and greens and sometimes pink and purples but the reef dwellers come in all the warmer colors. Interestingly, white and black markings are sparse and never the full dragon unless albino or melanistic. Piebald often results in pink or lavender marking, or even light cyan, and leustic SeaWings are known to be light blues and pinks. Vibrant, dark scales are preferred, and swirls are associated with power and royalty.

HiveWings all have some black scales, whether just a handful or nearly jet-black. Contrary to popular belief, Clearsight is not the sole reason for black scales; an interesting trait that started showing up after she arrived was pseudomelanism, a dominant trait causing all HiveWings to have black markings. Interestingly, albinism and leustism do not erase black scales, but albinism does soften them. Otherwise, HiveWings are typically warm toned, the general populace being yellow, orange and brown, red being an appealing color, and dark green being the rarest and most attractive. They can also being lighter tans and faded pinks, but the colors are looked down on.

SilkWings can be any color, and barring melanism, except black. Their patterns can change over their lifetime, gradually becoming more complex, vibrant, and appealing with age. All SilkWings are metallic or iridescent to some degree, except on the wing membrane. The wing membrane is either scaled and colorful (moth and butterfly) or translucent and shimmering (dragonfly). Circular, ring, or banded patterns are considered prettier and almost royal.

RainWings come in every color under the sun, yet never have shiny, iridescent, opalescent, or metallic scales. Individuals are recognized by resting patterns on theit scales such as circles, zigzags, splotches, or freckles than reflect secondary emotions or designs. Although they can replicate another's pattern quite accurately, the pattern they are born with lasts until death. In more competitive and regal places, RainWings are purple, pink, and yellow, and see showing emotion as weak.

[goldmanguyperson]

i have unaveragely good knowledge of conditions that affect pigment in animals, and i dont really know why

so fun facts with gold (take with grain of salt):

we all know about the albino condition, but what about lutino? the lutino mutation affects birds that can have a yellow color. it is genetically identical to albinism, but instead of making the bird white, it makes them yellow. Together they are known as the Ino mutation. Other animals can have this too but it most commonly occurs in birds, and the term lutino mainly refers to birds. Other animals are called xanthochromistic.

There is also leucism. In leucistic animals, the pigment cells rack up defects during their growth. Not all pigment cells are affected, meaning that leucistic animals can still have color and often retain color in parts of their skin and eyes. This is where piebalds come from!

Melanistic animals are completely black. They produce an excess of melanin, darkening their features drastically. This is the condition black panthers have.

One bird takes it further: the Ayam Cemani chicken breed. They have hyperpigmentation, which makes their bones and internal organs black as well. pretty metal little birdies

Abundism and pseudomelanism can make an animal appear completely melanistic, but they are not. They will usually have some lighter patches, which melanistic animals do not have.

Melanism and associated conditions are usually much less dangerous for the animal than albinism. Albinism basically means some animals get fuckin cooked real quick by the sun. Gators and crocs with albinism, for example, don’t last very long outside captivity. 24 hours tops.

Also fun bird color fact: The darker a bird feather is, the more resistant to damage it is. This means that albino birds get raggedy feathers much quicker. You might see a lot of birds with black feather tips specifically because that keeps them from getting damaged as easily. You may find that a lot of worn seagull feathers still have the black tips intact, or at least more intact than the rest of the feather.

colors is cool

[laskume-dragon]

After going through all my Dragon AU posts to make my masterpost i noticed that I've never actually talked about any specific characters. I dropped some tiny bit of general lore once....but that was about it.

So now that I've doodled Alucard, i decided to drop some general AU lore about him!

Species:

Alucard is a so-called Iceling and would be classified as western dragon.

Icelings are quadruped, two winged, of a very lean build and tend to show a lot of resemblance to wolves. They're generally covered in white fur and have feathered wings. Their paw pads, skin and nose are black while their eyes and tailfeathers tend to have bluish tones.

They're native to high mountain ranges and very cold regions.

Their fur then helps them to stay undetected in snowy areas, while the black skin has the same use as for polar bears, to stay warm.

Even though they're dragons, Icelings aren't reptiles. They're warmblooded mammals and their evolution is thus analogous to reptilian dragons, sharing a lot of the classic characteristics of a dragon, without sharing the same ancestor. Though birthing living young has a lot more advantages in cold areas then it is to lay eggs. At least for dragons that spit ice instead of fire and don't have as specialized breeding techniques like penguins. Though in general they're quite immune to freezing. A layer of natural antifreeze (i think glucose had that ability??) right under their skin, shields them from frost. A minimized bloodflow to the extremities and the skin also keeps them from loosing too much heat, making them probably very cold to the touch, while in their core they're warm.

Character appearence:

I said Icelings are usually white but Alucard isn't. What's up with that?

Long story short: gene variation and mutation still exists in this AU. So the magic term is ✨Melanism✨

Or more like pseudomelanism, cus Alucard is not entirely black. The degree of this varies with each form.

Vladcard: probably most black form of all with a few lighter patches of fur on his chest and belly.

Usual Alucard: left frontpaw and two primary feathers on each wing white, rest black

Lady-/Girlycard: mostly white with black patches scattered across her body. Ladycard & Girlycard are basically the same form, only differentiate in the age of appearance (if you know what i mean. Language is hard), depends on what Alu is in the mood for lmao

Backstory:

Has vague similarities to canon but at the same time its very different. Its kinda of patchy and probably things will change in the future but here's a summary of what i have so far:

Alucard was born into the leader family of a pretty big Icelingpack, which was having quite a lot of problems with neighboring packs and defending their territory and shite. So... environment was tense when he grew up and finally took over the pack. At some point there was a big attack on the pack and their territory, catching Alucard by surprise. The attackers, partially Tainteds, were ruthless and killed who they could, including Alucards mate and cubs at the time. He too then fell as he got attacked by another rogue Tainted. But bc they didn't really care what they were doing, they didn't notice that they hadn't killed him completely. Instead the tainting curse befell Alucard. His turn was rough, only driven to success by his own desperate want to stay conscious and alive.

So now he was an accidental tainted, with no master or guidance, no pack and unsure what the hell he even was. For a long time he stayed on his own as he struggled with bloodlust and powers he did not understand.

At some point he stumbled upon a demon (Baskerville) who was for some reason locked out of and unable to return to hell. On his own the demon wouldn't have survived on the mortal plain, but since both had something the other needed at the time, they formed a bond. Alucard needed guidance and company, which Baskerville could provide. In turn he received protection from Alucard and a body he could possess and reside in.

After gaining control over his tainted aspects, Alucard traveled north in search of new territory. He came across a piece of land that was under the rule of the Hellsing pack, lead by a strong goldheavic with the name Abraham (wink wink nudge nudge). Ofc as a stranger hanging around in some other packs territory and also injuring some residents there, when he needed to feed, (in opposite to canon he did not kill all kinds of random people just bc he needed a nibble lmao) Alucard quickly pulled the Alphas attention to himself. Since Alucard wasn't very keen on wrecking the same kind of havoc he had pretty much just survived, he formally challenged Abraham to a duel. This served as a matter of damage control, cus it would keep uninvolved dragons out of the fight and would still provide him with a pack and territory should he win.

Turns out he severely underestimated Abrahams strength and firepower, cus he got his ass KICKED. Still, Abraham was very impressed by Alucards strength and willpower and instead of killing him or driving him out of his territory, he took him in and let him join the pack, providing him with a new home.

And thats pretty much it.

Ofc i could keep going with Alucards life in his new pack but i kinda wanna make it a post of its own, so I'll stop right here.

If you actually took the time to read this absolute rollercoaster. Thank you! Have a cookie and, if you want, a hug!! I appreciate it very much. And if there are questions...pls ask.

I'd love to rant more about my AU lmao!!

[Masterpost]

[full-of-skritt]

Time for Asura Appreciation Week, as organized by the @asura-appreciation-corner! More pictures/images at the bottom of all the text!

Day 1: Talk About One Of Your Asura OCs

My main is my Daredevil Thief, Infiltrator Cixxe! Cixxe (pronounced like the number 6) is an odd case.

Cixxe was found as an infant by a small family of skritt in the ruins of a recently destroyed Asura research lab in Metrica Province. The remains of the lab was marked only with the number 6, which the skritt took to be her name (albeit with a little spelling flair), and adopted the little shadow. Now Cixxe has strong pseudomelanism, only her eyes and the small patch on her nose denoting that she's not truly melanistic, and her coloration helped her excel at stealth and thievery scavenging. Also her being not actually a skritt meant that she was the only member of the family with the ability to focus on more complex tasks and goals when split from the rest of the family.

Then, one day while the family was travelling between Scratches (skritt towns), a dangerous enough endeavor for a group of skritt, they were attacked by some asura who were trying to drive them away from their material storage. Cixxe was split from her family, and captured in the panic. Confused by this strange asura child, the researchers brought her back to Rata Sum where she was given instructors in an attempt to re-educate her back into proper asura civilization.

It didn't take.

Cixxe was a problem for every teacher and krewe she was assigned to, and eventually was given up on altogether. She was labeled a lost cause and ultimately, when she was a pre-teen/early teen, they gave up trying. Instead, she was given a warehouse/lab to live in and left much to her own devices as long as she didn't cause too much ruckus in the city. She began the slow work of tracking and rejoining her scattered family of skritt, housing them in her home lab where they could finally be safe and well cared for.

Not long after that she was scouted by the Order of Whispers due to her stealth skills, and while on some jobs for the Pact she met and was semi-adopted by a charr named Amara @drakeheart (who she refers to as 'mom' just as much as she does for her adopted skritt mother, Korri'kee).

Cixxe likes crystals and collecting junk, and has a particularly morbid fascination with the Brand and the crystalline formations of it.

[inaris-pokemon-world]

What could you happily give a two hour lecture on? :3 (info dumb awaaayyyy)

Okay, so SO! I am absolutely obsessed with genetics and color morphs. I read about them all the time when I have downtime. And I love the idea of figuring out Pokémon genetics, or at least how I’d do them.

Seeing pictures of color morphs like melanism, albinism, piebaldism, etc. get me so excited. Especially if you get into less talked about stuff like xanthochromism or isabellinism.

I will literally chat your ear off over things like the differences between albinism, amelanism, leucism, and isabellinism, or how pseudomelanism works. And do NOT get me started on white patching, dilution genes, or stuff like fur length and texture genes.

I’m not sure how understandable this is to people who don’t know about color morphs and such, but I’m always excited to talk about it!

[funnywildlife]

For this #ThrowbackThursday Enjoy Limited Edition "Tira" The Rare Polka Zebra calf. Current status: unknown Last update: taken by Tanzanian authorities for conservation and safekeeping from predators and other natural threats Tira is the only pseudomelanistic zebra cub known to humankind though very scarce photos like these. Pseudomelanism is a genetic mutation/ defect, which give a dark maroon fur and spots instead of black colour coat with white stripes for regular zebras. Tira was the name given to him for being first spotted and introduced to the world by Antony Tira The rarest and the shiniest jewel for animal kingdom indeed "TIRA" * Photos captured by #wildographer @anupam.thombre. Follow him for regular updates.. . #Wildography #unique #geneticmutation #pseudomelanism #zebrafoal #zebrasofinstagram #anupamthombre #africanwildlife #africaadventure #discoverearth #wondersoftheworld #masaimarasafari #tira #polkadottedzebra #rare #beautiful #beautifulnature #wildearth #wildportrait #animalportrait #beautifulanimals #nifhivefeature #conservation #sharethelove #onceinalifetime #wildlife_aroundworld #spottedzebra @nikonindiaofficial @discoverwildlife @natgeowild @africanimals @naturein_focus @discovery_uk @wildlife_world._ @wildestafrica @ccb.animals @animalelite @animals_captures https://www.instagram.com/p/CORFIpLATWy/?igshid=12tj1qfmwflsx

[the-unicorns-of-nienna]

[Image Description: a photograph of a zebra foal standing in a field. The foal has chocolate brown fur spotted with white. End image description.]

Rare polka-dotted baby zebra spotted in Kenya, likely has a genetic mutation called pseudomelanism.

[moobloom]

some pictures of Tira, the polka dot zebra!

[dont-wake-me-up-mate]