The Lace Snakeskin Defined

What is a Lace Snakeskin guppy? A Lace Snakeskin guppy is a snakeskin guppy with a lacetail. Though, as of late, some have erroneously referred to the term “lace” as having something to do with a fine snakeskin pattern. This usage simply has no provenance. And so, herein lies the necessity of this article.

Quite simply, the word “lace” is an English word, and its association with the guppy comes in the late 1940’s and early 1950’s with the occurrence of the English Lace Snakeskin guppies of G. W. Philips. Now, these guppies even predate the veil tails of Paul Hahnel, and as such were not much to look at, coarse, almost nonexistent snakeskin patterns. However, the lace pattern of the tail was unmistakable, only to improve with decades of selective breeding after G.W. Philip’s death. This is the simple origin and provenance of this little English word as it applies to guppies.

Enter German scientist Michael Dzwillo, who in 1959 makes the first scientific reference to “filigree”, which is the German term for snakeskin. I repeat snakeskin. Lace and snakeskin are not the same thing, though lace is most frequently found on a male guppy having a snakeskin body—but not always. Some have postulated that since Dzwillo made no reference to the term “lace”, the term associated with Philip’s guppies did not even last until 1959. The term “lace” has survived to this very day, and furthermore, Dzwillo was not studying lacetail guppies. He was studying run-of-the-mill, garden variety, plain vanilla snakeskin guppies. In no case would any snakeskin or lace snakeskin have had a “fine” snakeskin body pattern, or even a “fine” lace tail pattern for that matter, in 1959. Dzwillo was simply not studying lace genetics, or lacetail genetics. To my knowledge no one has, and it is now 50 years on from Dzwillo’s studies.
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Dzwillo was German, and it is only natural he would call the snakeskin pattern “filigree”. Lace is a decidedly English word with a decidedly English provenance. On top of that, the IFGA, which established the standards for guppies which are adhered to throughout North and South America, makes it clear what the term “lace” refers to. You will find the same in Singapore. Singaporean guppy judge, Derrick Tan and I have had many talks about the lace snakeskin guppy, and the term “lace” holds true on the other side of the Pacific.

The system of naming snakeskin guppies has always followed the format of tail type followed by the term "snakeskin" or "cobra". So essentially your template is __________ snakeskin, where the blank is filled in with "solid", for solid snakeskin, or "leopard", for leopard snakeskin, or "variegated", for variegated snakeskin. It is an easy convention and has always suited well.

On a final note, the erroneous usage of “lace” in referring to a fine snakeskin body pattern falls on its face from its own unwieldy weight. How so? Here is how so: Are you really going to call that Solid Snakeskin (solid-colored caudal) in the corner a “Lace Snakeskin” guppy just because it has a fine body pattern? Also, at what point is a fine snakeskin body pattern no longer “fine” and merely average—or even coarse. I have raised snakeskins for years, and that is a no win discussion because it is so subjective. A lacetail is not subjective, regardless of how coarse or fine, a lace guppy has that interlinked, web-like tail pattern. Many Red Metal Lace Snakeskins have a somewhat coarse tail pattern; and, yet, they are known the World over as “lace”. Very rarely does a Lace Snakeskin have a tail pattern so coarse that it would confound.