Leucistic Question

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Originally Posted by RichsBallPythons

Breeding a super form in any paring will yield NO normals.

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Yay supers!:gj:

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Originally Posted by RandyRemington

I wouldn't assume any gender of any morph can reproduce until proven. Likely most will turn out like the older mutations albino and piebald where we now have reports of them reproducing but there might be a few reproductive dud morphs. No particular reason to suspect most morphs but you just don’t know for sure until it’s proven to be ok.

Big Guns, can you confirm both male and female black eyed leucistics have reproduced so we can cross them both off the unproven list?

I'm working with a new line of chocolates but am years away from being able to confirm anything about either gender of super chocolate. Likely most all but the newest morphs have been proven by now but without clutch by clutch info from big breeders other than RDR we’ll have to wait for smaller breeders to grow up most projects and report the results.

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Originally Posted by Pals BP

Pals BP thinks this is just super!...lol.

I assume you have bred males and females, or know someone who has? Could you shed a little more light on this? Thanks

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Both males and females are not infertile. Where does crap like this get started anyway? Oh wait........for a second there BG forgot all about the internet forum "experts".:D

If BG says it.....nuff said.;):D Hope that's enough "light" for yah.:D

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Originally Posted by Big Gunns

Both males and females are not infertile. Where does crap like this get started anyway? Oh wait........for a second there BG forgot all about the internet forum "experts".:D

If BG says it.....nuff said.;):D Hope that's enough "light" for yah.:D

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I don't think Randy was trying to start rumors; I think that all he was getting at is just that for most mutations, we don't know what, on a chemical level, is really going on to cause the aberrant pattern that we see and breed for. For all we know, whatever mutation causes the unusual color or pattern could also cause a problem with fertility.

Do I think that most of them will be infertile or subfertile? No, not at all. So far, I can only think of two out of the dozens of morphs that have seemingly substantiated reports of fertility issues. I certainly don't think it would stop me from investing in a new morph if I thought it was promising. But it is always a possibility (just as it's always a possibility that the homozygous form will be lethal, or that there will be some other defect associated with the desirable morph gene).

I think it all depends on how you look at it -- just like you can look at an unproven morph or dinker as "It isn't a morph until it's proven" or, the more optimistic outlook, "It isn't a normal until proven normal," you can look at any new morph as "It isn't fertile until proven fertile" or "It isn't infertile until proven infertile." Glass is either half empty or half full type of thing.

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Originally Posted by Serpent_Nirvana

I don't think Randy was trying to start rumors; I think that all he was getting at is just that for most mutations, we don't know what, on a chemical level, is really going on to cause the aberrant pattern that we see and breed for. For all we know, whatever mutation causes the unusual color or pattern could also cause a problem with fertility.

Do I think that most of them will be infertile or subfertile? No, not at all. So far, I can only think of two out of the dozens of morphs that have seemingly substantiated reports of fertility issues. I certainly don't think it would stop me from investing in a new morph if I thought it was promising. But it is always a possibility (just as it's always a possibility that the homozygous form will be lethal, or that there will be some other defect associated with the desirable morph gene).

I think it all depends on how you look at it -- just like you can look at an unproven morph or dinker as "It isn't a morph until it's proven" or, the more optimistic outlook, "It isn't a normal until proven normal," you can look at any new morph as "It isn't fertile until proven fertile" or "It isn't infertile until proven infertile." Glass is either half empty or half full type of thing.

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Big Gunns wasn't saying anyone was "starting rumors". BG does know that threads like this is how it starts though. Something is posted like this...all the "experts" chime in....BINGO...... Lucy's are infertile. Happens all the time on the net. Most people(BG included) are lazy. They read the first couple posts on a thread and then comment. What they should do is look through the thread for BG posts, then comment. This would solve all the worlds problems(prolly cause more really):D

Very true. That would be a very sneaky (and mean) way for a rival breeder to start a nasty rumor -- "Hey, has anyone proved out ZYX mutation as fertile yet? I've never seen pictures of females on eggs ..."

No actual accusations, so it isn't exactly libel ...... But it does plant some (unfounded) seeds of doubt in people's heads.

Has there ever been any ball python morph that has problem with fertility? caramel albino is it isn't it? And even information on that seems to be sketchy. so 1 out of over 100 morphs possibly might have fertility issue, so is that less than 1% of morph going to make you doubt?

This thread:

http://www.reptileradio.net/reptiler...ad.php?t=20146

Also this one:

http://ball-pythons.net/forums/showt...-on-Eggs-Photo

... Shows the reason I think it's entirely possible that caramel female subfertility (though, clearly, not complete infertility) is a distinct possibility.

There are also "rumors" of desert females being too small to breed successfully, but I don't know enough about that to comment with any authority. (Seems to me like if you want to know about deserts, Pro Exotics would be the ones to ask since they seem to have a ton of wicked cool desert stuff going.)

So, yes, it would seem it's 1 - 2 morphs out of several dozen base morphs discovered so far. (Both females so far, too .....) Really not bloody many at all when you think about it!

I remember when I first got into breeding chinchillas a few years ago, the breeder I got mine from told me that the more mutation genes an animal had, the less likely it was to be fertile, and that my double co-dom female only had a 25% chance of fertility. :rolleyes: Well, so far, I have found that to be complete and utter nonsense, and can count a grand total of two animals (out of several dozen) that have proven to be infertile or subfertile. Still, though, there's always the possibility ... Hell, I have a normal female (ball python) who's on "strike two" for fertility at the moment! (Meaning, if I don't get eggs this season, she's going to a "pet home" ...)

It did take us a long time to hear about the possible problems with caramels (both high kinking and high slug rates). Although I'm still optimistic that with shared information both problems can be solved. If breeders like Mark and Bill can avoid the kinks and Sean and Brian can get good eggs consistently we just need to figure out what the variables are so we can all reproduce their success and the caramel mutation can move past these issues. Maybe it is outbreeding like most seem to think or some accident of environment or nutrition (my wacko theory) that can overcome these negative tendencies.

Are there other mutations with problems? I don't know. I'm probably being paranoid after the spider and caramel late disclosures. I give people a lot of credit to read the full threads, understand them, and decide for themselves. But I have seen rumors take off before from people apparently not understanding the difference between a question on a possibility and a proven fact. I realize it takes a long time for new morph females to mature and breed in enough numbers to happen for someone who'll bother to post pics so I'll just keep watching for them.

I like your nutrition theory re: kinking. I don't know if I think that's the answer or not, but it's a neat and different way of looking at the problem that I definitely appreciate.

I'll do a lit search today ('cos it's snowing, and that's a great thing to do when you're snowed in) and see if I can find out some other effects of enzymes downstream from tyrosinase in the melanin pathway that might be relevant. I think it must be a pleiotropic effect of the caramel mutation (and not a very tight linkage) because more than one founder animal has been brought in from the wild, and as far as we know, all lines kink. :(

My thought (and sincere hope!) is that very careful selection, careful outcrossing and very selective line breeding can decrease the percentage of caramels that kink, and/or the severity of the kinking, if not eliminate it entirely. I theorize (and please feel free to refute this) that most all genes with variable expressivity and/or incomplete penetrance can have their effects modified by other modifier genes.

For example, from what I've been reading about "piebald" horses and cattle, it's possible to select for certain patterns of piebald spotting (such as only on the head -- "medicine hat" -- in horses, and white "belting" in cattle). It requires generations of careful selection to "fix" those modifier genes (just like anything involving multiple genes), but it seems it can be done.

I'm also hopeful about the caramel because I've read in multiple places that some lines (Malsin/Upscale in particular) kink much less than others. Maybe it's just a rumor ... But I think it's possible that it's founded in some sort of experience, and that makes me hopeful. :)

Re: other lines with problems, the only one that really comes to mind is the sable ... Seems it is okay on its own, but gets much worse (sometimes even lethal) when combined with other mutations:

http://97.74.202.209/reptileradio/sh...ad.php?t=21957

That thread talks about the champagne sable, and I know I've read in a few other direct accounts that sable spiders do not survive.

That's one where I'll be foregoing the gene entirely and going with its "sister mutation," the chocolate, because my favorite combos with that gene are the spider, bumblebee or spinner chocolates, and you can't make those with sable!