Spider morph question

Hi, I‘m new and I’m still learning about the different morphs and the genetics behind them. I have found out that the spider morph is dominant but I am unsure what that means because if co-dominant genes like pastel shows even in the het form how much more can a gene do when it is dominant?
Just a guess but does it mean that it is homozygous and skips the het even when a spider is bred to a normal for example?

Another thing that I wanted to know is does a bumblebee royal have to be homozygous for pastel or can it be het for pastel and still be a bumblebee or would that be called a spider het pastel?

Markus Jayne, Ball pythons | ballpython.ca

The Learning Center

BPM : Genetics Lab




hope this helps

Welcome to the forum.:welcome:.

I'll give this my best shot. Here goes.

To date: The co-dom and dom Spider looks like a spider (both the het and homo form). Unlike the pastel's homo form (Super Pastel) the spider is still a spider. As far as the BumbleBee's gene (a triple threat breeder) goes. This BP has both Spider and Pastel genes visible, hence the result. Now when this guy is bred to a normal you have the possibility to produce nothing but morphs (triple threat).

When it come to co-doms, doms and recesive genes, the term Het really applies to the recesive type. I know this is confusing but hang in there. You see, with co-doms and doms the results are either there or not. You can either see its a pastel or a normal in a clutch. The term Het for (co-dom / dom) does not apply with this type of genetic trait. With recesive type hets you see all normals in a clutch (albino x normal). At this point all of the scale kids in this clutch are het for albino. The term Het for (resecive) does apply with this type of genetic trait.

A bit confusing but with time and some reading you'll get it eventually. You can do some searches in this forum for some really good reading. Hope this is clear as mud.. Welcome:welcome:

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Originally Posted by Royal Snakes

Another thing that I wanted to know is does a bumblebee royal have to be homozygous for pastel or can it be het for pastel and still be a bumblebee or would that be called a spider het pastel?

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in your terms

het for pastel + het for spider = bumblebee

homo for pastel + het for spider = Killer bee
(this is describing genetics, not what combinations of snakes are needed to make the above morphs, in reality there are many ways to make a bumblebee, and for a killer bee each parent MUST have at least the pastel gene, and either or both can have the spider gene)


Now I said het above because you did, but really you dont call them hets, that is more reserved for recessives in my book.

A pastel, is by definition, het for super pastel... that means the "het" form for the super pastel , is a pastel.

However we just ignore all of that, and because the "het" is a visible morph, we give it a name, and its homozygous aka super form, another name


Pastel, Super Pastel
Cinnamon, Super Cinnamon
Mojave, Blue Eyed Lucy
Phantom, Super Phantom
Yellow belly, Ivory


Super tag can usually just mean "homo" if that makes it more clear.

Why drop the het tags and homo tags? Look at recessives

Het for Albino, Albino
Het for Ghost, Ghost
Het for Axanthic, Axanthic

When the morph is visible, tags normally get dropped... We call an Albino an Albino, but we know it is really homozygous for albinio... Similar to how we call a pastel a pastel, when we really know it is het for super pastel.

Make sense? Im not fully awake yet, good luck!

Great post!

ok... now I'm confused, is there a super form of spider?

Good post snakey.... I was still asleep to use the examples...LOL:P

Super form of a Spider - NO. (or better yet, I have not seen one);)

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Originally Posted by Boarder4l154

ok... now I'm confused, is there a super form of spider?

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No. To date, no one has proven a visual "super" form of Spider. Whether het or homo for the spider trait, the snake looks the same. BUT...if you have a homozygous spider (bred to a normal), then all his babies will be spiders...where as, if you have a heterozygous spider (bred to a normal), then about half the babies will be spiders and half will be normals.

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Originally Posted by JLC

No. To date, no one has proven a visual "super" form of Spider.

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That you personally know of. Right? ;)

-adam

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Originally Posted by Adam_Wysocki

That you personally know of. Right? ;)

-adam

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To date, no one has published the existance of a super spider, however, crazy bp breeders out there are always "bustin' their balls!" to come up with hot new morphs, so we may see one soon.

That better Sir Adam? ;) :D

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Originally Posted by Adam_Wysocki

That you personally know of. Right? ;)

-adam

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man..... theres too many secrets in the breeding industry. I wanna be in the know too!

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Originally Posted by Adam_Wysocki

That you personally know of. Right? ;)

-adam

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I dont wanna know where it is, who has it, or what it looks like....yes or no...is there in fact a visual homozygous spider?????!

I guess if I had a male spider that I crossed to 10 normal girls every year for 10 years and came up with nothing but spiders...I'd keep it to myself to!

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Originally Posted by Royal Snakes

Hi, I‘m new and I’m still learning about the different morphs and the genetics behind them. I have found out that the spider morph is dominant but I am unsure what that means because if co-dominant genes like pastel shows even in the het form how much more can a gene do when it is dominant?
Just a guess but does it mean that it is homozygous and skips the het even when a spider is bred to a normal for example?

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Ball Pythons, like us, receive two copies of every gene-one from mom, one from dad. The copy they receive from mom and dad might not be exactly the same. We call these copies of a gene the alleles (or versions) of the gene.

The set of alleles that an individual has is called genotype. If an individual has two alleles of the same type he/she is homozygous for that allele. If he/she carries two different copies of a gene we call this individual a heterozygote (ote is the noun, ous is the adjective).

When talking about the dominance of a trait such as spider, what we are really talking about is the dominance relationship between the alleles or different versions of a gene. We are talking about how one allele of the gene pair influences the other allele of the gene pair.

A gene pair may show complete dominance or incomplete dominance. (In reality, it is more like a spectrum between the two polar opposites.)

If a gene pair is completely dominant in the case of spider, an individual needs only inherit one copy of the gene for it to manifest itself in the appearance (geneticists call this phenotype) of the snake. The dominant allele masks the effects of the other normal, or wild-type, allele. In genetic notation we usually represent a dominant allele with a capital letter. We might choose to represent Spider then as big S. In a completely dominant gene pair relationship S would completely mask the effects of the normal or wild-type allele, which we might choose to represent as a lower case s. The normal or wild-type allele in this case acts in a recessive manner.



In complete dominance, the genotype SS (homozygous dominant) would produce a snake that looked the same as a snake with the genotype Ss (the heterozygote). Hence, we can not completely determine the genotype of a snake for dominant allele simply by looking at the snake since SS looks the same as Ss.



Incomplete dominance describes the situation where the appearance of the heterozygote (Aa) is intermediate between the two homozygotes (homozygous dominant AA or homozygous recessive aa)



Pastel Jungles are an example of a snake trait that shows incomplete dominance. Pastel Jungle (P) is co-dominant with the wild-type trait (p). This means that the heterozygote Pp is different in appearance than the homozygous dominant individual (PP). Snake breeders call the dominant homozygote a super. So PP would be Super Pastel Jungle which is more vibrant in color than the pastel jungle individual (Pp).



Some of the terminology that snake breeders use can be confusing so watch out sometimes when people talk about pastels they are talking about cinnamon pastels while other are talking about Pastel Jungles….



Breeders can often combine different co-dominant traits to produce designer morphs…..this interests me immensely as a former geneticist and training science teacher…..



Hope this helps……

awesome post Mendel's Balls!

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Originally Posted by elevatethis

I dont wanna know where it is, who has it, or what it looks like....yes or no...is there in fact a visual homozygous spider?????!

I guess if I had a male spider that I crossed to 10 normal girls every year for 10 years and came up with nothing but spiders...I'd keep it to myself to!

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If you cross a homozygous dominant Spider (SS) to a normal, you would expect only Spider. This is no secret!

What I think Adam is talking about is a Spider line where the homozygous dominant form is more pronounced than the heterozygote. If such a line existed, then there would be such a thing as a super spider! This hypothetical line then would have a spider allele that acted in a co-dominant fashion.

This hypothetical situation is entirely possible considering that a gene is a biochemical entity. The mutation that produces a spider allele resides in a sequence of DNA. Another mutation somewhere else in the chemical sequence of the “spider” gene may produce a different spider allele which acts co-dominantly or in snake breeder terms….acts SUPER when the genotype is homozygous dominant (SS)!

I guess the moral of the story is it is important to realize that dominance relationships aren’t completely set in stone…..

Like I said above there is a spectrum between complete dominance and incomplete dominance….


Thanks for the kind words Well_Armed! :)

In other news, my gf (username: amy) and I just got our first BP, he ate for us on Tuesday…Tonight I think we are going to try to weigh him. :cool:

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Originally Posted by Adam_Wysocki

That you personally know of. Right? ;)

-adam

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Precisely. No one has publicly announced such a thing. I think it'd be pretty cool if someone proved me wrong on that. :P

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Originally Posted by Boarder4l154

man..... theres too many secrets in the breeding industry. I wanna be in the know too!

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LOL...I don't think Adam was implying that he knows something about this that we don't. (Although I wouldn't put that past him either!) He just likes to pull my chain (or anyone else's) when I make a blanket statement like that and forget to back it up with some sort of disclaimer about my personal ignorance. :P ;)

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Originally Posted by Mendel's Balls

If you cross a homozygous dominant Spider (SS) to a normal, you would expect only Spider. This is no secret!

What I think Adam is talking about is a Spider line where the homozygous dominant form is more pronounced than the heterozygote. If such a line existed, then there would be such a thing as a super spider! This hypothetical line then would have a spider allele that acted in a co-dominant fashion.

This hypothetical situation is entirely possible considering that a gene is a biochemical entity. The mutation that produces a spider allele resides in a sequence of DNA. Another mutation somewhere else in the chemical sequence of the “spider” gene may produce a different spider allele which acts co-dominantly or in snake breeder terms….acts SUPER when the genotype is homozygous dominant (SS)!

I guess the moral of the story is it is important to realize that dominance relationships aren’t completely set in stone…..

Like I said above there is a spectrum between complete dominance and incomplete dominance….


Thanks for the kind words Well_Armed! :)

In other news, my gf and I just got our first BP, he ate for us on Tuesday…Tonight I think we are going to try to weigh him. :cool:

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Hit the nail on the head basically. That's basic biology too. -Hums.- And I'm going to dive RIGHT into it.

Oh, and goodluck with that. ^_^

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Originally Posted by Melicious

Hit the nail on the head basically. That's basic biology too. -Hums.- And I'm going to dive RIGHT into it.

Oh, and goodluck with that. ^_^

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As a training science educator I like to see people learning bio.....:partyon:

MY Gf (Username: Amy) has some pics of our snake in her gallery.:snake:

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Originally Posted by Mendel's Balls

As a training science educator I like to see people learning bio.....:partyon:

MY Gf (Username: Amy) has some pics of our snake in her gallery.:snake:

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Some great info there! And welcome to BP.net!! It's always great to get knowledgeable folks signing on! Maybe you could wander over to the "Off-Topic" forum and introduce yourself and Amy? We'd love to know more about ya! :handshake:

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Originally Posted by Mendel's Balls

As a training science educator I like to see people learning bio.....:partyon:

MY Gf (Username: Amy) has some pics of our snake in her gallery.:snake:

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Me too. I quite enjoy it and especially if I want to be a breeder and an educator I need to know my schtuff.

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Originally Posted by Mendel's Balls

If you cross a homozygous dominant Spider (SS) to a normal, you would expect only Spider. This is no secret!

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Actually it sort of is. I think most agree that if there is a homozygous spider and it is just like the heterozygous spiders then yes, SS X ss = 100% Ss spiders. The secret is whether or not a homozygous (SS) spider has been proven to be viable and/or what it's like. So you are right, the controversy is on the nature of the homozygous spider but not just whether there is a line of homozygous spiders with co-dominant tendencies but whether there are any homozygous spiders at all.

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Originally Posted by RandyRemington

Actually it sort of is. I think most agree that if there is a homozygous spider and it is just like the heterozygous spiders then yes, SS X ss = 100% Ss spiders. The secret is whether or not a homozygous (SS) spider has been proven to be viable and/or what it's like. So you are right, the controversy is on the nature of the homozygous spider but not just whether there is a line of homozygous spiders with co-dominant tendencies but whether there are any homozygous spiders at all.

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I posted a related question about this in another thread, but I didn't get a response so I thought I would post it here. Does anyone know of any specific dominant traits that are incompatible in homozygous form? Not just with Balls, but with any species?

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Originally Posted by xdeus

I posted a related question about this in another thread, but I didn't get a response so I thought I would post it here. Does anyone know of any specific dominant traits that are incompatible in homozygous form? Not just with Balls, but with any species?

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There are numerous examples of dominant alleles incompatible (or lethal) in the homozygous form.

Yellow coat color in mice is one example. Yellow coat color (Y) is dominant to normal coat color (y). When you cross two hetrozygotes (Yy) x (Yy) over and over again you dont see the expected phenotypic ratio of 3 Yellow: 1 normal. Instead, you see a 2:1 ratio of Yellow to Normal.

The expected genotypic ratios of (Yy) x (Yy) is 1 homo dom: 2 hets: 1 homo recessive. The homo dom dies before birth so you dont get the 3:1 ratio that is predicted by a classic monohybrid cross.

The lethality of the yellow dominant allele has been confirmed by removing the utreus of preganant females of the (Yy) x (Yy) cross. One-forth of the embyros there have been found dead.....

Furthermore,in mice we can easily genotype an adult or embryo by using the techniques of molecular biology to look at the actual DNA sequences....this allows us to quickly determine whether an organism is a het or homo without doing millons of crosses (which is still really easy in mice compared to snakes).

And it just happens to be that in other studies those one-fourth that died in utreo were homozygous yellow dominant when tested by DNA testing!

Another example is the Manx cat with no tail. The dominant allele is lethal in the homozygous state.

As far as the spider goes I would think if you breed a Spider to a normal enough times then you can pretty sure beyond a reasonable doubt that it homozygous dominant....If you breed a spider to a normal and got 20 spiders then there would only be a 1 in a million chance (1/2^20) that your wrong.

I dont know how easy it would be to carry out this experiment. I dont know the typical cluth size from a gravid mother. IS it 7-9? How many breeding seasons can a female have babies in a row? I guess what I am asking is....Does she get worn out after two seasons?

At the same time there seems to be speculation (edit with help of elevatethis, for original see next post) that certain (or all) spider alleles are lethal in the homozygous state.....I know I saw something about "Spider Spinnning".....

I dont know much about that...I'll have to look it up in another thread....but it would make sense if the strange behavior caused by the Spider gene was viable in a single dose (het state) but lethal in a double dose (homo state).

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Originally Posted by Mendel's Balls

At the same time there seems to be suggestive evidence that certain (or all) spider alleles are lethal in the homozygous state.....I know I saw something about "Spider Spinnning".....

I dont know much about that...I'll have to look it up in another thread....but it would make sense if the strange behavior caused by the Spider gene was viable in a single dose (het state) but lethal in a double dose (homo state).

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Making claims like that without providing a link or a place to go to see the evidence you speak of is just, well, not cool. I've read a little bit on this on various message boards but otherwise have NOT seen any kind of real data on it.

I've got a normal girl that exhibits some of the "spinning" traits, but I wouldn't consider her to be a true spinner. The way she moves around is noticably different than the rest of my collection. I didn't even suspect anything was wrong until I got to see spinner in person. I wonder how many other people out there with pet snakes, who don't live breathe and eat the issues around bps ever day like we do, that have spinners and don't even realize it. It makes sense for people to notice every little detail in animals that cost as much as morphs do. With that in mind, is it right to directly associate ANY of these defects (spinning spiders, kinking carmels, etc) with the actual morph without solid data?

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Originally Posted by elevatethis

Making claims like that without providing a link or a place to go to see the evidence you speak of is just, well, not cool. I've read a little bit on this on various message boards but otherwise have NOT seen any kind of real data on it.

I've got a normal girl that exhibits some of the "spinning" traits, but I wouldn't consider her to be a true spinner. The way she moves around is noticably different than the rest of my collection. I didn't even suspect anything was wrong until I got to see spinner in person. I wonder how many other people out there with pet snakes, who don't live breathe and eat the issues around bps ever day like we do, that have spinners and don't even realize it. It makes sense for people to notice every little detail in animals that cost as much as morphs do. With that in mind, is it right to directly associate ANY of these defects (spinning spiders, kinking carmels, etc) with the actual morph without solid data?

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Sorry I wasnt more careful with my words.....it's more speculative than suggestive as you pointed out.

I wasnt tying to make a defiantive conclusion on Spiders.......I was just hypothesizing that maybe the reason why people havent seen or have proof of a homozgous spiders is that it is lethal in the homozygous state. If het Spiders are more prone to Spinning, and that is a big if, then that would make sense.

Thanks for keeping me honest and on my toes....I corrected my error but acknowledged it above as well. The Peer Review on this site works well!:D

I dont know if there is any consensus (doesnt seem like it from this site) on whether or not a homozygous spider exists. Makus Janye Ball Python Site (http://www.ballpython.ca/what_get/dominant.html) shows breeding pairs with homozygous spiders....

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Originally Posted by Mendel's Balls

I dont know if there is any consensus (doesnt seem like it from this site) on whether or not a homozygous spider exists. Makus Janye Ball Python Site

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Thanks for all of the info on the Homozygous Lethal trait. That expression has been thrown around a lot with Spiders, and it always stirs up a big controversy. It's understandable because a lot of people have a lot of money invested in these snakes, and unfounded rumors can have a huge impact on the demand.

The reason I asked wasn't so much directed at Spiders, but rather I was curious about what had been substatiated in actual experiments.

Personally, I don't think the spinning attribute associated with Spiders has anything to do with the lack of a homozygote. From what I understand, Pinstripes are very similar and may not be able to produce a homozygote as well, but seem to lack the spinning quality.

I'm sure a lot of these questions will be ironed out in the next few years as people produce more of these little guys.

Oh, and to answer your question about breeding females, I think generally breeders will try to give their females off a year in between clutches, or at least give them a season off for every two that they breed. A lot probably depends on the individual snake, though, and how soon they are able to get back up to their original weight.

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Originally Posted by Mendel's Balls

I wasnt tying to make a defiantive conclusion on Spiders.......I was just hypothesizing that maybe the reason why people havent seen or have proof of a homozgous spiders is that it is lethal in the homozygous state. If het Spiders are more prone to Spinning, and that is a big if, then that would make sense.

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Ok, well I'll keep it going, and I think I disagree:

If there are so few heterozygous spiders exhibiting the trait, then the chances of EVERY homozygous spider exhibiting this trait in lethal form would be just as slim.

I think the real reason that not many or zero people have made a claim to having an homozygous spider is more political. No one wants to make a claim to having an homozygous spider, and then have it sire normal babies the next season.

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Originally Posted by elevatethis

Ok, well I'll keep it going, and I think I disagree:

If there are so few heterozygous spiders exhibiting the trait, then the chances of EVERY homozygous spider exhibiting this trait in lethal form would be just as slim.

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Its all speculation... but I was thinking of it as the spider allele in a single dose may prone to develop abnormally if subjected to certain environmental stressors......The double dose that the homo domainant has might be too much.....it might push viabiablity pass some point of no return.....

Yellow het mice as far as I know are completely normal and a double dose of this dominant allele leads to complete lethality...so it might not be as unlikely as you think....

The spider allele either way has interesting genetics.....spider also tend to have better presonalities I hear? Smells like this allele does have multiple effects, one of which could be viability.....

Maybe someday there will be a ball python genome project....:P

Quote:

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Originally Posted by elevatethis

I think the real reason that not many or zero people have made a claim to having an homozygous spider is more political. No one wants to make a claim to having an homozygous spider, and then have it sire normal babies the next season.

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Agree that this is likely and also agree with what you said about how people with morphs tend to more observant about their snakes behavior.

You're right....this is a complicated issue and way over our heads...most of what I know about it is all secondary, either from reading boards or talking to breeders. I think the observation of the "spider personality" just shows that the issue isn't just skin deep, so to speak.