Question about genetics guarantee

Reputable breeders offer genetics guarantee on their animals especially hets. My question is how is guarantee enforced? What if your customer has really bad odds with a het? How many clutches/eggs does it take to disprove a het?

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Originally Posted by Gerardo

Reputable breeders offer genetics guarantee on their animals especially hets. My question is how is guarantee enforced? What if your customer has really bad odds with a het? How many clutches/eggs does it take to disprove a het?

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Well, several years ago the five top breeder families got together and formed a organization called Herper Inc. whose job it is to whack any breeders who authorized unsanctioned hets.



Just kidding. There is no enforcement and to make a slight correction, a lot of breeders, not just reputable ones, will offer a genetics guarantee on their animals but only a reputable one will stand behind it. If you browse the BOI on Fauna, you'll see some cases where some supposedly good guys, who have been around for many many years, failed to back the guarantee or offered, in my opinion, very little compared to the damage done.

Trust the breeder, not the guarantee itself, because it is worthless if the breeder doesn't stand behind it. There is no set number of clutches or eggs. It'll be until the breeder feels its enough, and even then, may want the snake back to cross himself if it's a high dollar snake.

To give you a ballpark, I think there was a recent case where a het was declared as disproved after 36 eggs? I can't remember if it was crossed with a visual or het. Personally, I would never accept a claim if a het was crossed with a het because you can't control the legitimacy of the other het... should only be visuals to disprove.

Tell you the truth the Het guarantee is basically the breeders word. If your a reputable breeder your word is on the line so it is a pretty good chance that they are giving you what they say. The only way to be 100% sure would be to breed the het with a visual animal ie 100%het pied X pied this would get you (theoretically) 50% hets and 50% visuals. Of course you can have really bad luck and get no visuals so i would think to breed it a few more years to prove out. I would guess after 3 breedings (I guess that would depend on egg count also) with a visual and no results then it can be disproved. if it is a grown animal this is 3 years if it is a hatchling 5+. After all that time you would then have to prove to the breeder that it is actually the animal they sold you (long shot) and then have to somehow convince then to reimburse you. this is a lot of headache and you most likely wont get anything out of it. I would just go through a reputable breeder and be done with it.

I do buy from reputable breeder. Especially hets. I was more asking about the breeder's point of view. I plan on doing some pied breedings that will likely produce hets. Since I don't have a reputation I would hate for an impatient customer to question the legitimacy of the genetics in the animals I produce and making it that much harder to sell any hets.

I would say 3 clutches minimum preferably with a visual OR one of the breeders known hets.
Anything that isn't a visual will always be a gamble.
Makes dealing with recessives fun. :gj:

In order to prove it's the same animal, a photo ID is useful for both parties. BP markings are pretty distinct.

Otherwise, if a breeder is certain the animal is a het and a buyer wants their money back after several clutches(2?3?) and he takes it back, he should be getting an adult het ready to breed. After all, the breeder is sure it's a het, right?

One of the issues comes when you're now faced with what the buyer is entitled to. Original purchase price doesn't take into account the 3-5 years the buyer has wasted feeding and raising and breeding it. So should they get more? What about price drop? What if a adult het is only worth what a hatchling was worth when it was sold?

There is also the possibility that even a 100% het(bred from visuals, etc) could end up glitching and NOT carrying the gene. No fault of the breeder, because it can happen to anyone, without ill intent. But the reputation of the breeder would be at risk.

Hets are a big knot of possibilities, both good and bad. They're a great way to get awesome genes, but also a risk.

So are genetics guarantees worthless and more designed to make the customer feel better about the purchase? Has anybody dealt with a situation where the guarantee came into play?

No. Its as good as the seller.

Technically speaking a genetics guarantee is just the seller's word in writing. So it serves as a contract in writing that states the genetics for the animal. I prefer to have a photo ID on each paper if possible just so the snakes can't be accidentally mixed up(or deliberately swapped) at any point.

How does a new breeder can gain reputation if people keeps getting their animals from Reputable breeders?

i.e. How does a new breeder sell their hatchlings if nobody wants to deal with him/her because he/she doesnt have reputation or is well known?

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Originally Posted by fLako0aGuiiLaR

How does a new breeder can gain reputation if people keeps getting their animals from Reputable breeders?

i.e. How does a new breeder sell their hatchlings if nobody wants to deal with him/her because he/she doesnt have reputation or is well known?

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Building your reputation is not all about prior sales, a strong online presence that will show that you are knowledgeable will help a great deal.

You can tell a lot about people who post online :gj:

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Originally Posted by fLako0aGuiiLaR

How does a new breeder can gain reputation if people keeps getting their animals from Reputable breeders?

i.e. How does a new breeder sell their hatchlings if nobody wants to deal with him/her because he/she doesnt have reputation or is well known?

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You don't have to be widely known, but you want to cultivate the best impression possible with anyone who contacts you about your animals. In a word, TRUST. Advertise with good properly lit photos, with the snake on a clean surface (no old sheds, no poop!!). Build a decent website, You tube videos, face book page - or just have a reasonably professionally sounding voice mail message. Good information and social skills go a LONG way. Also, healthy well bred animals have a "bloom" to them. Provide carefully kept records with each sale.

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Originally Posted by Deborah

Building your reputation is not all about prior sales, a strong online presence that will show that you are knowledgeable will help a great deal.

You can tell a lot about people who post online :gj:

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Originally Posted by distaff

You don't have to be widely known, but you want to cultivate the best impression possible with anyone who contacts you about your animals. In a word, TRUST. Advertise with good properly lit photos, with the snake on a clean surface (no old sheds, no poop!!). Build a decent website, You tube videos, face book page - or just have a reasonably professionally sounding voice mail message. Good information and social skills go a LONG way. Also, healthy well bred animals have a "bloom" to them. Provide carefully kept records with each sale.

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Thanks for the advice, this is very helpful for people that is starting in this industry :gj:;)

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Originally Posted by Deborah

Building your reputation is not all about prior sales, a strong online presence that will show that you are knowledgeable will help a great deal.

You can tell a lot about people who post online :gj:

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This x 1000! A small-scale new breeder can be incredibly reputable just as easily as a large-scale established breeder. Of course, the opposite is true as well. Thankfully, there are plenty of avenues to try and determine which are which. :cool:

Agreed on the reputable appearance and online presence. But also, make contacts and build a base of other reputable breeders. Be personable and ask lots of questions and find out about their collections and projects.

Don't... repeat... don't go to shows and be "that guy" who strolls around badmouthing other people, belittling animals at tables, lowballing people on their prices and then badmouthing them if they turn down the offers. Don't call yourself things like "best breeder around" or try to sound more knowledgable than you are. Don't ever say things like "I'll undercut any price!".

Being a good breeder is not just about having great animals, but also about being a part of the community. Even if it's just online, or even if it's just your local community... it's important.

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Originally Posted by Gerardo

.... How many clutches/eggs does it take to disprove a het?

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The formula is p to the nth power (pⁿ) < 0.01.
p = probability of not getting what you want from a single egg
n = number of eggs

Here's the easy way to calculate the formula. Using the calculator in Windows' Accessories folder, choose view --> scientific. Then enter the value of p, press the x^y key, enter a value for n, and hit the <ENTER> key.

Example 1: You have a normal looking ball python that could be heterozygous albino. You mate it to an albino ball python. You want albinos, and you do not want normal looking babies. The probability of getting an albino is 0.5, and the probability of getting a normal looking baby (p) is 0.5.

Multiply 0.5 by 0.5 for as many times as it takes to get a number less than 0.01.
In this case, 0.5 * 0.5 * 0.5 * 0.5 * 0.5 * 0.5 * 0.5 (or 0.5 to the seventh power) = 0.008 (rounded). In other words, seven normal looking snakes and no albino snakes has less than a 0.01 probability of occurring by chance.

Example 2: You have a normal looking ball python that could be heterozygous albino. You mate it to a normal looking, het albino ball python. You want albinos, and you do not want normal looking babies. The probability of getting an albino is 0.25, and the probability of getting a normal looking baby (p) is 0.75.

Multiply 0.75 by 0.75 for as many times as it takes to get a number less than 0.01. In this case, 0.75 to the seventeenth power = 0.008 (rounded). In other words, seventeen normal looking snakes and no albino snakes has less than a 0.01 probability of occurring by chance.

The above assumes that albinos and nonalbinos have an equal chance of hatching. This is not always true. Or you may have plain bad luck. But it is the place to start, and almost all of the time it will give the right answer.

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Originally Posted by paulh

The formula is p to the nth power (pⁿ) < 0.01.
p = probability of not getting what you want from a single egg
n = number of eggs

Here's the easy way to calculate the formula. Using the calculator in Windows' Accessories folder, choose view --> scientific. Then enter the value of p, press the x^y key, enter a value for n, and hit the <ENTER> key.

Example 1: You have a normal looking ball python that could be heterozygous albino. You mate it to an albino ball python. You want albinos, and you do not want normal looking babies. The probability of getting an albino is 0.5, and the probability of getting a normal looking baby (p) is 0.5.

Multiply 0.5 by 0.5 for as many times as it takes to get a number less than 0.01.
In this case, 0.5 * 0.5 * 0.5 * 0.5 * 0.5 * 0.5 * 0.5 (or 0.5 to the seventh power) = 0.008 (rounded). In other words, seven normal looking snakes and no albino snakes has less than a 0.01 probability of occurring by chance.

Example 2: You have a normal looking ball python that could be heterozygous albino. You mate it to a normal looking, het albino ball python. You want albinos, and you do not want normal looking babies. The probability of getting an albino is 0.25, and the probability of getting a normal looking baby (p) is 0.75.

Multiply 0.75 by 0.75 for as many times as it takes to get a number less than 0.01. In this case, 0.75 to the seventeenth power = 0.008 (rounded). In other words, seventeen normal looking snakes and no albino snakes has less than a 0.01 probability of occurring by chance.

The above assumes that albinos and nonalbinos have an equal chance of hatching. This is not always true. Or you may have plain bad luck. But it is the place to start, and almost all of the time it will give the right answer.

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Nice to see another match nerd, but I just want to point out, this equation is only getting you to 99% certainty. While that's pretty good. Nature just doesn't always follow math. IMHO, HetxHet is three clutches of at least 6 viable eggs(only one more egg than purported above by maths). HetxHom is one clutch of at least 6 viable eggs where the snake in question is known absolutely to be a parent. In the case of males, it must be obvious that there was no retained sperm preventing the male in question from seeing the female. In the case of a female, if she's a virgin, first clutch should be good, if she's not, again, it needs to be obvious that she did not retain sperm from the previous year, regardless of who bred her.

This brings up another question in my mind. I've seen several times lately of people underselling their snakes. Not enough blushing on a possible firefly, call it a pastel and sell yourself short. Hopefully the person getting it is happy with that. I know I would be. But what do you do in this case. Refund, take the snake back and re-sell for more? I'm perfectly happy with the sale being final if I undersell myself, but it could be an interesting conundrum, especailly if someone is working on something like a vanilla cream or vanilla scream project. Or You have BELs with extra genes.

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Originally Posted by Gerardo

Reputable breeders offer genetics guarantee on their animals especially hets. My question is how is guarantee enforced? What if your customer has really bad odds with a het? How many clutches/eggs does it take to disprove a het?

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Well, it's always customer friendly and reassuring to provide a written guarantee for a breeders hets. Pictures of the parentage and any locks seems to be appreciated as well. Of course the verbal backing of the genetics should serve as a solidifying addition to the paperwork and photos. Photographing of the particular het usually is a help to both buyer and seller. The breeder should identify the percentage of the het genetics as well. A paper trail is a main way a breeder can show a customer that he stands by what he is saying and selling. :)

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Originally Posted by FranklinMorphs

Nice to see another match nerd, but I just want to point out, this equation is only getting you to 99% certainty. While that's pretty good. Nature just doesn't always follow math. IMHO, HetxHet is three clutches of at least 6 viable eggs(only one more egg than purported above by maths). HetxHom is one clutch of at least 6 viable eggs where the snake in question is known absolutely to be a parent. In the case of males, it must be obvious that there was no retained sperm preventing the male in question from seeing the female. In the case of a female, if she's a virgin, first clutch should be good, if she's not, again, it needs to be obvious that she did not retain sperm from the previous year, regardless of who bred her.

This brings up another question in my mind. I've seen several times lately of people underselling their snakes. Not enough blushing on a possible firefly, call it a pastel and sell yourself short. Hopefully the person getting it is happy with that. I know I would be. But what do you do in this case. Refund, take the snake back and re-sell for more? I'm perfectly happy with the sale being final if I undersell myself, but it could be an interesting conundrum, especailly if someone is working on something like a vanilla cream or vanilla scream project. Or You have BELs with extra genes.

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It is true that math and nature do not always match up. However, the OP wanted to know how many clutches/eggs it takes to disprove a het. The actual answer is that a breeding test cannot produce 100% certainty that a possible het is not a het. That leads to the question, "How many clutches/eggs are required to get to an acceptable level of probability?" 99% probability is generally considered an acceptable place to stop a breeding test. More eggs simply adds places to the right of the decimal point without ever getting to 100%.

IMO, more people undersell their snakes than is likely to be believed. I once bred a pied ringneck dove from two non-pieds. On one side of the pedigree I had to go back five generations to find a pied ancestor. I just goes to show that a recessive gene can pass down several generations without the human owner knowing it. Even dominant and codominant genes can do this. [A condition (most commonly inherited in an autosomal dominant manner) is said to have complete penetrance if clinical symptoms are present in all individuals who have the disease-causing mutation, and to have reduced or incomplete penetrance if clinical symptoms are not always present in individuals who have the disease-causing mutation. http://ghr.nlm.nih.gov/glossary=penetrance] It is all part of the fog surrounding breeding.

That math is amazing. I never would have thought about it in that way and it makes absolute sense now in my head. Thank you.

Also, yes, you can't ever guarantee something with live critters, but generally speaking, I agree with the math. You can't really ever say for certain sure, just that it's extremely unlikely at a point. Glitches just happen once in a great while, no matter what we think should happen.