Breeding with only homozygous snakes.

My normal is my favorite out of my three snakes. She is the nicest pattern and personality, plus she was my first snake. I really do believe that once i start getting her up to a reasonable weight, she will be a great addition to my breeding plans. Plus once i get a Bumblebee, she will help me out singleing out all the genes.

Actually, i believe if you had 2 het recessives you could have a 1 in 4 chance of getting the homozygous form.
But from working with some of the big breeders it seems the common way to produce, is a male visual to a female het. And they just deal with the 50% odds and worst case produce more hets. I believe its more economical for them this way.

I just got rid of a bunch of my normals to make room for more morphs... I figure why spend $75 or so per year on rats for a ball python that will make me less than that in babies each year?

It costs as much to feed a normal as it does a quadruple morph. I have limited space for snakes and rats, so my collection is forced to stay small so little choice but to phase out my normals.

I can see the rationale for keeping normals if you have the space. You buy a $20,000 male of a new dom/co-dom morph...you want to be able to put him to as many females as possible to try and recoup your funds ASAP (before the annual co-dom/dom price drop kills you). 8 big female normals could get you 25+ morph babies to sell. Even with a price drop to $2000 ea you make your money back and then some.

First I am going to say I have not read every post on this thread but I do have to state my mind here.

The biggest reason why you should NOT only breed homo to homo is because that would lead very quickly to no out crossing which reults in huge amounts of kinked babies which results in them being put down if they are that bad.

I totally disagree with only breeding homo to homo for those reasons as well as the simple fact that normals are what sell the easiest. I bring 1 pied and 10 normals to the local reptile shop and they will buy the normal and turn their nose up at the pied because their customers can not buy the pied. It is pretty simple really to figure out that normals will not go out of style ever.

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Originally Posted by ladywhipple02

I agree with you, to a point.

Personally, my goal is to get awareness out there.

Every one of my friends and even coworkers knows that I keep and will soon breed ball pythons. Most are curious and ask about the snakes. A few have even asked about getting one someday.

And these people aren't interested in getting a $300 animal...they just want something that they can enjoy.

If I can get awareness out that these are gentle creatures and that they make good pets---while also educating about how to keep them---then those normals that I produce will go to good homes, and I will also be helping spread the entire hobby.

I think most people here at the forum would like to see the knowledge spread, until, at some point, having a ball python is just as accepted as having a cat or dog.


Here's where I agree with you: once these animals start becoming more mainstream, you're going to see the same issues you already see with cats and dogs, i.e. too many animals that end up unwanted and left behind.

It's a fine line to tread. So far, the hobby seems to be growing slowly, so hopefully we can build a decent infrastructure of education before it gets out of hand.

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These animals will never "become more mainstream" I'll bet the farm on it.

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Originally Posted by Mike@OutbackReptiles

I just got rid of a bunch of my normals to make room for more morphs... I figure why spend $75 or so per year on rats for a ball python that will make me less than that in babies each year?

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So from what you just said when I sell 3 normal males at $25 each that does not equal 75?

Sorry to be rude but your wording could have been better. You could have compared that normal to any morph and it would have been a lot better wording.

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Originally Posted by tattlife2001

The biggest reason why you should NOT only breed homo to homo is because that would lead very quickly to no out crossing which reults in huge amounts of kinked babies which results in them being put down if they are that bad.

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OK - I'm a huge fan of normals, the normals in my collection are some of my favorites. But your theory makes no sense. If I have a mojave male from Breeder X and a mojave female from Breeder Y, I've just outcrossed the bloodline. Neither mojave shares common parentage.

If I breed a pinstripe to a black pastel, I've just outcrossed the bloodline.

Why would you assume that those breeding homozygous animals to homozygous aren't acquiring animals from different and diversified bloodlines?

I would have to go look, but I believe someone once shared the statistic that cornsnakes have been line bred for up to 10 generations with no marked increase in genetic defects.

Genetic defects like kinking in caramels or wobbling in spiders appear to be linked to certain morphs, not from line breeding.

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Originally Posted by Mike@OutbackReptiles

I just got rid of a bunch of my normals to make room for more morphs... I figure why spend $75 or so per year on rats for a ball python that will make me less than that in babies each year?

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If you breed that normal female to a double or triple combo, she's more than earned her keep in offspring.

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Originally Posted by rabernet

OK - I'm a huge fan of normals, the normals in my collection are some of my favorites. But your theory makes no sense. If I have a mojave male from Breeder X and a mojave female from Breeder Y, I've just outcrossed the bloodline. Neither mojave shares common parentage.

If I breed a pinstripe to a black pastel, I've just outcrossed the bloodline.

Why would you assume that those breeding homozygous animals to homozygous aren't acquiring animals from different and diversified bloodlines?

I would have to go look, but I believe someone once shared the statistic that cornsnakes have been line bred for up to 10 generations with no marked increase in genetic defects.

Genetic defects like kinking in caramels or wobbling in spiders appear to be linked to certain morphs, not from line breeding.

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You are correct but the way it is stated a mojo is not the homo form. So you would only be breeding supers to supers and so on which any crossing would lead to something that is not a super so you could not breed that because all you breed is a homo animal not hets or normals.

My whole point is that if you only breed homo to homo that would mean no more recessive traits because as soon as you cross that the next generation that would be bred would in fact create normals. Very quickly line x of albino and line y become the same so when line z is bred to it you no longer have anywhere to out cross.

I do know that all morphs started with one animal from the wild and they were bred and then line breeding was done but then out crossing was done to normals. When most of us here on this sit get that first pastel or albino or anything we line breed to make more of them but if we are smart we then out breed to make for stronger genetics.

Also according to the way it is wording in the OP a pastel would not be bred because you would produce normals so only a super pastel would be bred. Spiders and all other dom traits would not be bred at all because they too create normals. So from this we lose all co-dom traits, all dom traits and are left with the recessive traits that will very quickly be inbred and they will start to produce more and more genetic deformities. There would be no combo morphs at all because they too create normals unless you have something such as the panda pied that will make cinnis het pied and only that but then you are left with animals that make more normals.

I took this in a literal way. Exactly as it was posted. If I took this wrong please let me know but that is how it is worded. Basically why breed anything that is going to make more normals.