How do you know...?

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Originally Posted by Spaniard

CtrlFreq Am I following this right...

What you're saying is any co-dom trait is het for the super form?

So we could if we wanted to call regular pastels "Het for Super Pastel"?

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Technically that is correct, yes. Properly, a pastel has a heterozygous allele pair for the pastel gene, and a super pastel has a homozygous allele pair for the pastel gene.

The problem with ball python naming in general is that the morphs are named after the visual representation. Since the heterozygous forms of co-dominant and dominant traits are usually found long before the homozygous version, the hets get named one thing, and the homozygous versions another (ie. Fire/Black Eyed Leucistic, Mojave/Blue Eyed Leucistic, and so on).

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Originally Posted by soy.lor.n

But yellowbellies are often called het ivories
maybe it's just because it's a (MUCH) less obvious mutation than the other het co-doms

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Yes...... :confused: Did you mean to quote me?

Baby Steps...if you start telling someone who has no idea about genetics..."Heterozygous means you carry one normal and one active allele for a particular gene. Dominant and Co-dominant genes both produce visible mutations in their heterozygous form."...it will simply go right over their head.

It's easier for me and others to grasp the little words :) Later on when I feel like studying deeper in to the more technical genetic terms and how they work, then I will keep it in my own mind unless i'm talking to someone who is on the same level and understands genetics the way i do.

but when someone wants to know what a het is, I just give them an answer they might be able to grasp. If they're really that interested and want to learn more, then I'm sure they will :) :gj:

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Originally Posted by Freakie_frog

It's always a word game isn't it we try and keep it simple for beginers to undrstand...

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There is a difference between simple and confused. Simple would be pointing out that there are two separate and distinct ideas to understand - gene nature (recessive, co-dominant, and dominant) and gene pairing (normal, heterozygous, and homozygous).

Instead most people are taught genetics as a mash-up of the two concepts, and so beginners are often in the weeds for much longer than they should be.

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Originally Posted by Freakie_frog

Which is true last time I checked all super forms of co-dom animals are visual mutations.

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That is true.

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Originally Posted by Freakie_frog

And since it takes 2 copys of the genetic code to produce if an animal only has one copy

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This is not correct, and an example of exactly what I'm talking about. It only takes 1 copy of the code to produce a visual mutation when the gene in question is either co-dominant or dominant by nature.

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Originally Posted by Freakie_frog

So you can't make a super codom or visual recessive with out both HALVES or COPYS of the genetic code.

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That was never the argument. The point is you CAN have a visual morph without having both "HALVES" when the gene is not recessive, a concept that most beginners, and apparently a good number of non-beginners have trouble grasping.

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Originally Posted by Freakie_frog

So in truth Pastels are Het Super pastels, YB's are Het Ivories, Het Reds, Het Russos', all are visual co-dominate mutation that carry one half of the genetic code needed to produce a visual mutation.

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Except they are themselves, in their heterozygous forms, visual mutated animals, which is why they've been distinguished as morphs.

the fact is....heterozygous ONLY means that the two alleles present are not the same. It doesn't matter what the two alleles are, as long as they're different. It doesn't matter if one is simple recessive and the other is dominant, or if it's more complex than that. "hetero-" means different and "homo-" means the same (think heterosexual, homogenized, homophone, etc...)

HOWEVER..."het" (not "heterozygous") in the snake community pretty much does mean "normal with 1 allele for a recessive trait" because there's generally a name already for the heterozygous co-doms, and there's no distinction for the heterozygous vs. homozygous forms of the dominant traits. I don't think it's that bad to tell someone that hets are normal that carry a gene for a recessive trait. Especially if you then link them to some place to learn more of the details.

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Originally Posted by littleindiangirl

Yes...... :confused: Did you mean to quote me?

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well yeah, because you said a het is a carrier for a recessive trait, and that's not always true

LOLOL, this OP will just be all the more confused now hahahaha

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Originally Posted by soy.lor.n

well yeah, because you said a het is a carrier for a recessive trait, and that's not always true

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In the terms for genetics it is. Do you have an example maybe?

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This is not correct, and an example of exactly what I'm talking about. It only takes 1 copy of the code to produce a visual mutation when the gene in question is either co-dominant or dominant by nature.

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But since 99.995% of all animals labeled as hets are recessive morphs. Then to keep it simple would it be simpler to say that a "Het" carries one half the genetic code needed to created a visual mutation. Instead of trying to confuse people by pointing out that technically a het can be a visual mutation?

Ok so I had right in my head. It gets confusing with all the different wording that gets thrown around...I was second guessing myself.

Edit: I've never had a problem with understanding genetics. Me and my punnit squares do fine to figure out % of outcomes. But once you get into explaining it to someone else it becomes a bit confusing.