Caramel Female on Eggs??? Photo???

I still wonder if there might be an environmental tweak that could decrease both your chances of slugs and kinks. Would be interesting to know if the few breeders who have reported long strings with no kinks also get more eggs than slugs. The tweak could be something accidental and hard to nail down like feeding rodents that either have extra or lack normal levels of some vitamin that relates to whatever the caramel mutation is changing in the caramel ball's chemistry.

When I first read this post when it was started I thought this will be settled pretty quickly. People who normally don't post pics will chime in and these doubts will be put to rest. After following this thread I now have a different opinion. It seems that there is now enough data to at least raise questions about the fertility of Caramel females. Has anyone talked to Kevin @ NERD? He is a pretty straight shooter when it comes to stuff like this.

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Originally Posted by RandyRemington

I still wonder if there might be an environmental tweak that could decrease both your chances of slugs and kinks. Would be interesting to know if the few breeders who have reported long strings with no kinks also get more eggs than slugs. The tweak could be something accidental and hard to nail down like feeding rodents that either have extra or lack normal levels of some vitamin that relates to whatever the caramel mutation is changing in the caramel ball's chemistry.

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I don't think it's entirely off the radar, but I also can't quite imagine what it could be. (Humidity or temperature during incubation does make sense, since we know that abnormal incubation conditions can cause kinking in all snakes, but I feel as though if that were the answer, we'd know it by now.) I guess some sort of nutrient that is poorly metabolized by caramels isn't out of the question; I'm just having a difficult time coming up with what it could be.

When I bought my male caramel I spoke to the breeder about the kinking and he told me honestly that he never had any problems at all with one bloodline, but when he added a new bloodline he saw kinking in the offspring out of the new animal. Since Mazuri feed had been discussed previously as a potential source of that "missing nutrient," I specifically asked what his rodent supplier feeds, and he said that it isn't Mazuri and that he doesn't buy that theory.

I've also consistently heard that some bloodlines kink more than others (ie, Malsin line is supposed to have fewer kinking problems).

I don't know ... I just keep trying to make a nice molecular biology story to tie these things (the T+ albinism, kinking and sub-fertility) together, but I'm having a hard time coming up with something that explains everything ...

Hi,

Typically I can't find the post now that I need to reffer to it but wasn't there some discussion it was it was a problem with copper uptake?

And that a rodent feed with a high copper content might help?

Then again I'm sure I also read you don't wanrt to give rodents too much copper. :rolleyes:


dr del

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Originally Posted by dr del

Hi,

Typically I can't find the post now that I need to reffer to it but wasn't there some discussion it was it was a problem with copper uptake?

And that a rodent feed with a high copper content might help?

Then again I'm sure I also read you don't wanrt to give rodents too much copper. :rolleyes:


dr del

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Here's the thread you were looking for: http://ball-pythons.net/forums/showt...ine-Inbreeding Post #31 is where discussion begins about kinking in caramel albinos and the subsequent discussion of nutrition as a potential cause of kinking.

As far as overloading rodents with copper, I think that would be incredibly difficult to do through dietary means alone...

I'm not utterly blown away by the copper hypothesis -- I like the line of thought, but copper deficiency in mammals typically manifests with muscle wasting and/or neurologic signs, and neuro signs seem to be one thing most caramels are blissfully without.

Still looking for something (on a molecular level) to tie together at least the kinking and repro issues ... I mean, those two things don't have to be tied to the pigment deficit; the two genes could just be tightly linked ...

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Originally Posted by Serpent_Nirvana

I'm not utterly blown away by the copper hypothesis -- I like the line of thought, but copper deficiency in mammals typically manifests with muscle wasting and/or neurologic signs, and neuro signs seem to be one thing most caramels are blissfully without.

Still looking for something (on a molecular level) to tie together at least the kinking and repro issues ... I mean, those two things don't have to be tied to the pigment deficit; the two genes could just be tightly linked ...

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Hmm, copper deficiency can cause demineralization of the bone as well, which was most likely what brought that hypothesis about. Something about the mutation may make it more difficult for caramel albinos to properly allocate copper for bone formation, thus resulting in kinks.

I have seen that, but it looks as though the neurologic effects of copper deficiency are much more common ... I just feel as if we'd see a lot more weakness and wobbliness if copper uptake were the answer. I think that affected babies would be weak, small, and maybe kinked, as opposed to just kinked. Y'know?

Now, though, I think maybe you're onto something with the whole mineral allocation thing ... How about calcium? They are obviously using calcium just fine for most cellular functions, but what if there was some mutation in a protein that allocates structural calcium -- ie, in bone and eggshell formation?

I'm sure that's been thought of before ... Now, if only we had some way to test the hypothesis! :rolleyes:

Most of the females we've been hearing about have been slugging out as well though. I would imagine you'd see more eggs with really thin shells if it had to do with structural calcium. I would be quite interested to see whether fertile eggs from female caramel albinos have thinner shells than other ball pythons though now.

I heard rumours that the problem is caused by vitamin C deficiency, like bifid spine in humans.... so vit C supplements in females that will produce caramels would be effective.