Spider x Spider results

General consensuses seems to be this pairing happens all the time, yet I never see reports about it. So here is mine, if anyone else has reliable results to give, feel free to share.

I paired my Spider x Spider together, last male she saw before him was 2 years ago, my male lesser.

Lock observed, after a few months she laid 2 slugs and 4 good eggs (she laid 5 good eggs and no slugs previously). I noticed one of the eggs go bad a ways through the process (wish I had a day count), I did cut open the egg and found a way under developed snake that obviously stopped developing long before I noticed a bad egg.

The remaining 3 eggs went full term, 1.1 spiders and 1.0 normal. Here are quick cell phone pics of the spiders, I will try to get better ones once they shed out. They are also possibly part of one of my dinker projects, so if the female looks like she might be, I will be keeping her and be able to report her breeding results.

http://i1269.photobucket.com/albums/...psml6msq3i.jpg

Thank you for posting this. I'm a believer in the theory that spiderXspider is not a lethal combo. I am currently pairing my lesser bee to my killer bee hoping for positive results

i look forward to hearing your results. I honestly think it is lethal in some sense. However I am basing that opinion mostly off all the hearsay and very few actual records. While I might not be hopeful ill still get to see what this little female produces.

Yea I can't wait till my mojave spider female gets up to size because I've been wanting to breed her to my male normal spider

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Originally Posted by aLittleLessButter

Thank you for posting this. I'm a believer in the theory that spiderXspider is not a lethal combo. I am currently pairing my lesser bee to my killer bee hoping for positive results

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I am looking forward to seeing your results, too. However, to determine whether a pair of spider genes is lethal, we have to make spider to spider matings as you are doing. Then the spider babies must be mated to non-spider ball pythons. If any normal babies occur, the spider parent does not have a pair of spider genes. A couple of dozen of those matings should give decent statistics. I'd also like to see a compilation of the results of spider mated to non-spider. That would tell us whether or not spider babies develop and hatch just as well as non-spiders.

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Originally Posted by paulh

I'd also like to see a compilation of the results of spider mated to non-spider. That would tell us whether or not spider babies develop and hatch just as well as non-spiders.

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What info are you looking for exactly with this?

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Originally Posted by paulh

I am looking forward to seeing your results, too. However, to determine whether a pair of spider genes is lethal, we have to make spider to spider matings as you are doing. Then the spider babies must be mated to non-spider ball pythons. If any normal babies occur, the spider parent does not have a pair of spider genes. A couple of dozen of those matings should give decent statistics. I'd also like to see a compilation of the results of spider mated to non-spider. That would tell us whether or not spider babies develop and hatch just as well as non-spiders.

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That's the idea. I know there are a few big breeders that are playing around with the same plan but so far they have put out no results favoring either side which gives me hope.

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Originally Posted by paulh

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I'd also like to see a compilation of the results of spider mated to non-spider. That would tell us whether or not spider babies develop and hatch just as well as non-spiders.

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Originally Posted by OhhWatALoser

What info are you looking for exactly with this?

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Number of normal babies and number of spider babies from each clutch. Number of eggs and number of slugs would be nice to have, too.

We know that spiders tend to wobble. Does the spider gene also make a spider embryo less fit to survive to hatching, compared to a normal?

Probability theory says to expect 100 normals and 100 spiders out of 200 eggs from spider x normal matings. What if there are 80 spiders and 120 normals? Or 120 spiders and 80 normals? Or some other difference from expected? A Chi-square statistical test will tell whether the difference seems to mean something.

If the number of spider hatchlings is significantly less than the number of normals, it would support the belief that a ball python with a pair of spider genes is likely to die before hatching.

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Originally Posted by paulh

Number of normal babies and number of spider babies from each clutch. Number of eggs and number of slugs would be nice to have, too.

We know that spiders tend to wobble. Does the spider gene also make a spider embryo less fit to survive to hatching, compared to a normal?

Probability theory says to expect 100 normals and 100 spiders out of 200 eggs from spider x normal matings. What if there are 80 spiders and 120 normals? Or 120 spiders and 80 normals? Or some other difference from expected? A Chi-square statistical test will tell whether the difference seems to mean something.

If the number of spider hatchlings is significantly less than the number of normals, it would support the belief that a ball python with a pair of spider genes is likely to die before hatching.

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I get what you are getting at now. Well I think the fact that we have many less severe wobble morphs, when combined with spider turn into lethal or train-wreak might add to that. I mean as far as heterozygous forms go, spider seems to be the worst wobbler. based on that alone it would be reasonable to assume it would see the worst lethality of them all, then maybe, just maybe, it is so bad that it doesn't even develop fully most of the time....

Thank you OWAL for sharing these results! I think it's very helpful information for everyone who breeds balls. I think it's in everyone's best interest to be transparent with genetics, especially regarding health issues. Anyway, I'm rambling, but thank you again!