sperm retention

I have been hearing a little bit about sperm retention and how it can affect clucthes the next season. I am just curious about if anyone has had any interesting experience with this phenomenom. This is our first season so I have no experience but am just interested to hear some cool stories! Thanks!:)

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Originally Posted by dahlhouse23

I have been hearing a little bit about sperm retention and how it can affect clucthes the next season. I am just curious about if anyone has had any interesting experience with this phenomenom. This is our first season so I have no experience but am just interested to hear some cool stories! Thanks!:)

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hmmmm.... sounds like a fun fact to learn about!

someone chime in who knows!

i have heard of this though! im guessing its true.

I have heard stories of this happening so I am assuming it is true. Just hasn't happened to me yet!

So far we all have heard stories... but that is it.. lol

I personally had it happen three times. I even had a girl retain sperm for two breeding seasons. I sold a friend of mine a normal that I bred a Pin to and she didn't take. The following year my friend bred her and she didn't go for him. This year he bred her to a Pastel and she ended up producing Pastels and one Pinstripe.
All I have to say is be aware of what you are using when you are breeding your females.
For instance, if I bred a female to a Co-Dom one year I would not breed that same girl to a Recessive the following year for fear of sperm retention.
I have always heard stories of this, but after witnessing it myself I am very careful when I pick my pairs to breed for Hets.

Thanks for the personal encounter! Nice to hear more than just "I have heard stories" I will definitely be careful about my breedings, especially with recessives and hets!!

I haven't seen it with BPs yet (only been into them for about two years now) but I have had it happen with blood pythons. I bought a small adult WC "male" in mid 2005. In late 2006, after "he" had bulked up quite a bit, I tried pairing "him" with a couple different known females, but they didn't mate. One day I looked in on them and found the WC "male" laying a clutch of eggs.

Unfortunately I didn't have an incubator set up yet (I'd only been pairing them for about a month, so I figured there was no way I could have eggs ..!), and the one I slapped together didn't quite do the job, so I only got a baby to within about a couple weeks to term. It was a fully-formed baby, though.

We have only had it happen once (possibly twice). First time we bred a female normal to a pastel in fall of 2007, she didn't lay. The following year fall 2008 I bred her to a cinnamon and I think a yellow belly (I would have to check the records) she layed midway into 2009 and when the eggs hatched we produced pastels and normals.

The (possible) second time was this year. We purchased a proven breeder in Dec 09 to add to our collection and bred her in March 10 to a mojave and a yellow belly and she laid 8 eggs. We hatched out 3 spiders and 5 normals. This female was obviously bred to a spider before I bought her, but I don't know when. So I can't say how long she retained this sperm or if she was just bred to a spider in the fall of 2009 and we just hatched a multi sire clutch with the only visable morphs from the spider.