BP crossed with other species

I've seen the super ball (ball/blood) but has there been any other attempts or projects currently or in the past?

For those who havent seen the super ball:
http://www.roussisreptiles.com/colle...lls/super.html

The Carpall CarpetXBall and the Wall - Woma X Ball, and I forget the name but the Angolian X Ball

Wow, can you finds some pics? :D

Found a Burmball and a albino Burmball:

(scroll down)

http://www.schlangenfrank.de/bilder/diashow/index.htm

To think that some people have a problem with designer morphs. To me this cross breeding of species is a little freaky. They don't even originate from the same countries. It just seems wrong to me.

Not sure if your talking about me.

But if your referencing to the other thread, I don't have a problem at all with morphs, i just wanted to see other opinions.

I think hybrids are cool as well. Actually more interesting than morphs IMO.

Humans have interracial relationships too. :D

Hi,


Yeah but we tend to frown on interspecies erotica.:P


dr del

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Originally Posted by dr del

Hi,


Yeah but we tend to frown on interspecies erotica.:P


dr del

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hahaha. Yep. I'm personally against hybrids and inter sub-species breeding. The Wall looks pretty cool, but I still don't like the idea.

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Originally Posted by N4S

Not sure if your talking about me.

But if your referencing to the other thread, I don't have a problem at all with morphs, i just wanted to see other opinions.

I think hybrids are cool as well. Actually more interesting than morphs IMO.

Humans have interracial relationships too. :D

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I'm not talking about any one person. I wouldn't equate this to interracial breeding. Humans are a species among themselves. Interracial racial breeding in more like morphs in the snake world. I'm not trying to offend anyone with that statement. I'm just trying to clarify my point. Heck, I'm part German, Scots, Irish, Swiss and God knows what else. Hybrids in snakes is more like mixing Quarter horses with Clydesdales or a Rottweiler with a poodle. It's just wrong IMO.

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Originally Posted by Royalherper

I'm not talking about any one person. I wouldn't equate this to interracial breeding. Humans are a species among themselves. Interracial racial breeding in more like morphs in the snake world. I'm not trying to offend anyone with that statement. I'm just trying to clarify my point. Heck, I'm part German, Scots, Irish, Swiss and God knows what else. Hybrids in snakes is more like mixing Quarter horses with Clydesdales or a Rottweiler with a poodle. It's just wrong IMO.

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I think breeding a rottweiler to a poodle is the same as interracial breeding, being that rotts and poodles are different sub-species of the same species. Not to offend anyone either, and correct me if I'm wrong. And your different nationalities aren't different sub species. They are all considered Caucisoid.

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Originally Posted by PythonWallace

I think breeding a rottweiler to a poodle is the same as interracial breeding, being that rotts and poodles are different sub-species of the same species. Not to offend anyone either, and correct me if I'm wrong. And your different nationalities aren't different sub species. They are all considered Caucisoid.

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I didn't say different nationalities are different subspecies. Thats why I compaired it to morphs in the ball python species.

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Originally Posted by PythonWallace

They are all considered Caucisoid.

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And in my case glaikit as well.:P

You said interracial breeding is like morphs. Inter nationality breeding is like morphs. Interracial breeding is like the rottweiler to the poodle example. Morphs are all Regius, German, Swiss, Scottish and Irish are all Caucasoid. I'm Norwegian, Welsh, Dutch and German, by the way. I'm not possitive about the dogs, though. Someone correct me if I'm wrong.

All breeds of dogs are "morphs" of the same species.

Hybridization in mammals would be something like the liger (lion/tiger cross) or the zorse (zebra/horse).

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Originally Posted by slartibartfast

All breeds of dogs are "morphs" of the same species.

Hybridization in mammals would be something like the liger (lion/tiger cross) or the zorse (zebra/horse).

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Aren't different breeds of dogs different sub-species?

most hybrids are genetic dead ends since they are usually sterile but i believe that the superball isn't sterile which is cool but alot of care needs to be used when playing with hybrids.

Nope. They are pretty much all human-developed breeds, and can all cross-breed within the physical limits imposed by their respective sizes.

I would consider dogs, dingos, and wolves to be subspecies of canines, as they can reproduce easily with each other. I'm not sure what the official stance is on this at present; it seems to fluctuate.

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Originally Posted by Royalherper

They don't even originate from the same countries. It just seems wrong to me.

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That is not always necessarily true. The Angolan x Ball hybrid has been created on more than one occasion. Those two species do actually have a range that overlaps each other in Angola. Now, I highly doubt that a Woma or Carpet Python or a Burm would ever run across a Ball.

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Originally Posted by slartibartfast

I would consider dogs, dingos, and wolves to be subspecies of canines, as they can reproduce easily with each other. I'm not sure what the official stance is on this at present; it seems to fluctuate.

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Um... thank you!

Basic biology here guys. ALL humans are in the same species. All dog breeds (poodle, rottie, shepherd, etc.) are the same species, just bred selectively for different qualities (like morphs).

Subspecies can sometimes have offspring, like the canine example above. Also, the example of becoming sterile after breeding - offspring a dead end - happens with donkeys and horses. They can have offspring, but offspring are sterile.

Breeding a Blood python with a ball is cross-species - a hybrid, as someone said. That does enter the territory of questions that may arise - is that morally / philosophically right?

It's all part of the genetic engineering slippery slope - selective (in-species) breeding, hybrids, cloning, turning genes on and off, inserting genes in nucleus of another species' eggs, etc.

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Originally Posted by Royalherper

I'm not talking about any one person. I wouldn't equate this to interracial breeding. Humans are a species among themselves. Interracial racial breeding in more like morphs in the snake world. I'm not trying to offend anyone with that statement. I'm just trying to clarify my point. Heck, I'm part German, Scots, Irish, Swiss and God knows what else. Hybrids in snakes is more like mixing Quarter horses with Clydesdales or a Rottweiler with a poodle. It's just wrong IMO.

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That's not true, regarding the horse breeds. If you were to breed a horse to a donkey and get a mule, that is like breeding two different types of pythons. And since I know of many mules that serve their owners well and make awesome animals with the benefits of both sides of their lineage, I can't complain about snake hybrids.

New question... I know we can't handle a Burmese due it's size. How big do the Burmballs get? Anyone know?

i just want to know how its even done. do ball pythons just voluntarily mate with other species of snake or does there have to be some coaxing involved?
and personally i don't see what wrong with it, unless something crazy happens. i think i remember hearing that when you cross a lion with a tiger somehow it "turns off" the growth inhibitor gene and they get huge. maybe someone will create a true monster snake like in the movies?

The primary problem with it is that the hybrid offspring, UNLIKE mules, are very often not sterile with one or more of the parent species.

This means a burm-ball could be bred back to a ball python, or to a Burmese. When you do that, you will wind up with a snake that is 25% hybrid, but may look like a pure-blooded ball python or burm.

And that's where the danger lies--this animal, which looks like a pure ball python (for example), might potentially be sold, stolen, given, willed...whatever...to someone who does NOT know what it is. That individual may then go on to breed the hybrid again, and sell the offspring (1/8 burmese) as normal ball pythons. You have now introduced, accidently, the DNA of another species into the bloodlines of ball pythons, and no one knows that it's there. And that's giving people the benefit of the doubt. Consider just how much money some of the new color and pattern morphs are selling for, think about how tempting it would be for someone to acquire a hybrid, cross it back to a ball python deliberately, keep the offspring showing aberrant patterns or colors from their non-ball-python parent, and market their offspring as a brand new ball python morph.
Who's going to find out about what they've done? And how?

The flipside of this argument is that these animals are NEVER, ever going to be released into the wild in their native environment, and their genes will never go back into those wild populations. They are, and will ALWAYS be, purely pet snakes kept by interested people. As such, if we crossbreed them with all sorts of different species, and turn them into absolute weirdo mongrel snakes, it doesn't really matter--we're essentially developing domesticated herptiles, not preserving a wild animal species. It is very difficult to argue with this--certainly, albino spider ball pythons are not in any way a preservation of traits of the ball python species. They would be unlikely to survive in the wild at all, even if by chance one occurred there. We have created them because we intend to continue keeping them as pet animals. Therefore, anything that makes our pets more appealing should be just fine, as long as they are healthy...right?

That having been said, hybridization just doesn't sit right with me. I couldn't explain why I devalue hybrid animals, but I personally don't care for them, and wouldn't own one (let alone create one). Perhaps it's for the same reason some people who eat organic food refuse to eat anything genetically engineered, no matter what's been done to it. It's not always logical, but there it is.

On the confustion over species and subspecies:
Humans have no other subspecies (we are Homo sapiens sapiens) --therefore, racial differences among humans are like linebred color or pattern traits in leopard geckos. (Not recessive, dominant, or co-dominant genetic morphs, but simply line-bred characteristics). Humans suffered a genetic bottleneck back around the time the supervolcano Toba erupted--our species was reduced to only 5000 to 10,000 individuals--we are all descended from them, and in spite of our apparent differences, it simply hasn't been long enough since then for us to differentiate into subspecies. On a complete side-note, the oldest surviving genetic line of humans lies in Africa...their 'race' is parent to all of us. I was somewhat pleased to learn that these ancient people are the San--the African Bushmen made famous in the movie "The Gods Must Be Crazy". So, we are all the descendents of these incredibly tough, intelligent, enduring, and above all sane, people. Let's hear it for genetics research.

Dogs, ALL domestic dogs, ARE a subspecies. A single subspecies. They are Canis lupus familiaris--and so is the Dingo. The Dingo is a wild 'breed' of domestic dog. A chihuahua and a wolfhound are the same subspecies. Their differences are line-bred characteristics. (In spite of being all of one subspecies, they still have more genetic variation between them than the human 'races' have).
Dogs as a species are wolves. There are a variety of other subspecies of wolves. All are Canis lupus.
To put all of this hybridizing into perspective...
If you crossbreed a king snake (Lampropeltis getula) with a milk snake (Lampropeltis triangulum) then you have created a hybrid. This hybrid is the equivalent to breeding a wolf or domestic dog (Canis lupus) to a coyote (Canis latrans).
But what folks have been doing with snakes is even more bizarre. They have not only crossed animals of different species...but of different GENUSES.
They have crossbred a king snake (Lampropeltis getula) to a corn snake (Pantherophis guttata). THIS is the equivalent of crossing a human (Homo sapiens) with a chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes) and getting living, viable, and fertile offspring. Don't look so shocked. While most scientists reassure us that such a crossbreeding isn't possible, the reality is that we can't be sure of that, because no one has ever made a real public concerted effort to hybridize us with our closest living relatives. It could happen. The fact that it HAS happened with snakes proves that the old criteria for determining species are obsolete--breeding to produce fertile offspring is no longer a valid way to determine species--OR genus. It never was. Now we must rely on genetics. (Which is why dogs are no longer Canis familiaris --genetic studies have proven them to be Canis lupus after all, and a 'wolf-dog hybrid' is only a subspecies hybrid, not a true species hybrid).

The Burm-ball is an inter-species hybrid--both Burmese and Ball pythons are in the same genus (Genus Python).

The Wall (Woma-ball) is an inter-genus hybrid, as Womas are Aspidites ramsayi, and ball pythons are Python regius.