I'm stumped

So, Pretzel will be up to size this year, after raising her for 2+ years. :D

But I'm stumped with what to run through her :confused:

The possible options are: Lemon Pastel, Mojave, Yellowbelly, Jolliff Tiger and "maybe" a Spider if he gets up to weight in time (but the spider is a big if for being ready).

She's nice and dark, and wonderful black back. I've been leaning more towards Mojave and Jolliff Tiger, because I'm worried that with her being so dark, that she'd "dull" out the Lemon Pastel.

She'd be perfect for an albino project, but I don't have any albino's or even het albino's.

http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e9...PretJune19.jpg

What would YOU do? :P

Id plug her into my lesser:D


Seriously, i think she might look good with a mojo

I'd breed her to your Spider, I like lighter girls for pastels and mojos. I'm going to breed my lesser to three very different girls and can't wait to the see the difference, My first girl is a dark normal my second one is almost axanthic like, and my third is a blackback with so much yellow its unreal. As always good luck with either route Robin.

Since everything you are talking about is a co-dom or dom trait cycle them all through her. Its not like if you get a mojave you won't know who the father is! Also you will not be wondering if any normals are carriers of any traits. (Let me state I am not sure about the Joliff Tiger, but I believe it is a dom.) Also our biggest problem is getting the boys going. Right now we have our biggest girl paired up with a double morph that is genetic dark morph and co-dom banded. He is a proven breeder and they locked up within the first 3 hours and have now beein locked for 24 hours. The other one we are trying is our Graziani pastel male who is also het for Albino with another of our big girls. He has the idea, but just can not seem to get his tail under her. He has his body sideways and it looks like he is trying to push it under, but no luck during the first 24 hours. The last pair or should I say trio we are trying is a Male cinny with our proven female, nothing appears to be going on here other than her laying on top of him. We are going to rotate her with the cinny and our mojave and hope one or both of the guys do something. We figure if we get mojo babies we know who the father is. If we get cinny babies we know who the father is. If we get normals who cares who the father is cause they are still normal!

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Originally Posted by Gloryhound

Since everything you are talking about is a co-dom or dom trait cycle them all through her. Its not like if you get a mojave you won't know who the father is! Also you will not be wondering if any normals are carriers of any traits. (Let me state I am not sure about the Joliff Tiger, but I believe it is a dom.) Also our biggest problem is getting the boys going. Right now we have our biggest girl paired up with a double morph that is genetic dark morph and co-dom banded. He is a proven breeder and they locked up within the first 3 hours and have now beein locked for 24 hours. The other one we are trying is our Graziani pastel male who is also het for Albino with another of our big girls. He has the idea, but just can not seem to get his tail under her. He has his body sideways and it looks like he is trying to push it under, but no luck during the first 24 hours. The last pair or should I say trio we are trying is a Male cinny with our proven female, nothing appears to be going on here other than her laying on top of him. We are going to rotate her with the cinny and our mojave and hope one or both of the guys do something. We figure if we get mojo babies we know who the father is. If we get cinny babies we know who the father is. If we get normals who cares who the father is cause they are still normal!

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You know I'm not a big fan of this method for one major reason.

First Robin I think a Tiger or Winston would be hot!, Now I think we have starting see some lower quality offspring because people that are just getting started are not paying as much attention to how the pair could possibly complement or work against each other as they could. I feel like people are just in such a hurry to produce anything that the over look the part that is the most fun. Just throwing two animals together and hope the offspring look good isn't my idea of selective breeding. However finding animals that have traits that would compliment each other and pairing them up is to me a better way to go about it. If its no big deal what the offspring look like so be it, but I for one want to produce the best offspring I can so I look for animals that will complement each other. Selective breeding is the future and of this market when pastel are 125.00 across the board the way to stand out isn't by lowering prices its by producing the best quality animals you can. Look at Albey, His Mojaves are second to none, Adam produces the best Cinni's I've ever seen, Tim with his Hypos and Axanthics.
These are people we need to take example from.

Just my two cents.

I would breed her to the yellowbelly out of your choices. You cant have enough of these to make combos with . But I think a het red would be my first pick:)

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Originally Posted by rabernet

So, Pretzel will be up to size this year, after raising her for 2+ years. :D

But I'm stumped with what to run through her :confused:

The possible options are: Lemon Pastel, Mojave, Yellowbelly, Jolliff Tiger and "maybe" a Spider if he gets up to weight in time (but the spider is a big if for being ready).

She's nice and dark, and wonderful black back. I've been leaning more towards Mojave and Jolliff Tiger, because I'm worried that with her being so dark, that she'd "dull" out the Lemon Pastel.

She'd be perfect for an albino project, but I don't have any albino's or even het albino's.

What would YOU do? :P

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That is a tough one Robin. Her best attributes are her pattern, which is killer looking, but like you said her color is dark. That rules out the Pastel for sure. The yellowbelly could be cool if it adds that Black back to the offspring. I am thinking further down the road when making Yellowbelly combos like a Pastel Yellowbelly might be really nice. The Mojave might work even though I personally like the lighter colored ones. A Black backed patterned Mojave could be great looking. Think Adams heavy patterned Cinnamons. I am not familiar with the Jolliff Tiger but if it looks like it sounds with a Tiger pattern then it might be the best match of all. Mixing patterns can really look tough.

Good luck with whichever you decide.:gj:

Mojave or Spider!!

and keep back all the females :)

Robin,

I'm been producing some really smoking hot yellow bellies the last couple years from dark adult females. Heavy heavy checker board belly patterns and hot flames ... they're not the brightest yellow YB's in the world, but the intensity of their patterns and their contrasting darks are super hot in my opinion. I would go yellow belly on that girl and hope the black back is co-dom-ish ... it could make for a very cool odd ball YB baby or two.

Just some food for thought.

-adam

I vote YB :gj:


BTW - got a belly shot of that girl?

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Originally Posted by Beardedragon

Id plug her into my lesser:D


Seriously, i think she might look good with a mojo

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Sure, send him right over! :P

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Originally Posted by Emilio

I'd breed her to your Spider, I like lighter girls for pastels and mojos. I'm going to breed my lesser to three very different girls and can't wait to the see the difference, My first girl is a dark normal my second one is almost axanthic like, and my third is a blackback with so much yellow its unreal. As always good luck with either route Robin.

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I don't think that the spider will be up to weight, unless I breed her late in the season (and if I feel comfortable breeding a young male). Can't wait to see YOUR results, Emilio!

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Originally Posted by Gloryhound

Since everything you are talking about is a co-dom or dom trait cycle them all through her.

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I thought about that - but I'm really working on selectively breeding, and I want to figure out what I think she will complement best.

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Originally Posted by Freakie_frog

You know I'm not a big fan of this method for one major reason.

First Robin I think a Tiger or Winston would be hot!, Now I think we have starting see some lower quality offspring because people that are just getting started are not paying as much attention to how the pair could possibly complement or work against each other as they could. I feel like people are just in such a hurry to produce anything that the over look the part that is the most fun. Just throwing two animals together and hope the offspring look good isn't my idea of selective breeding. However finding animals that have traits that would compliment each other and pairing them up is to me a better way to go about it. If its no big deal what the offspring look like so be it, but I for one want to produce the best offspring I can so I look for animals that will complement each other. Selective breeding is the future and of this market when pastel are 125.00 across the board the way to stand out isn't by lowering prices its by producing the best quality animals you can. Look at Albey, His Mojaves are second to none, Adam produces the best Cinni's I've ever seen, Tim with his Hypos and Axanthics.
These are people we need to take example from.

Just my two cents.

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I agree with you there, Froggy!!! :D

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Originally Posted by travisjara

I would breed her to the yellowbelly out of your choices. You cant have enough of these to make combos with . But I think a het red would be my first pick:)

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Leaning more toward the YB or the Tiger. Don't have a het red in my collection - YET! ;)

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Originally Posted by Albey

That is a tough one Robin. Her best attributes are her pattern, which is killer looking, but like you said her color is dark. That rules out the Pastel for sure. The yellowbelly could be cool if it adds that Black back to the offspring. I am thinking further down the road when making Yellowbelly combos like a Pastel Yellowbelly might be really nice. The Mojave might work even though I personally like the lighter colored ones. A Black backed patterned Mojave could be great looking. Think Adams heavy patterned Cinnamons. I am not familiar with the Jolliff Tiger but if it looks like it sounds with a Tiger pattern then it might be the best match of all. Mixing patterns can really look tough.

Good luck with whichever you decide.:gj:

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Albey, thanks for your input! This is my Jolliff Tiger (possible double het snow). And he's one of my favorite males all on his own! He's actually lighter than the pictures - smoking hot boy.

http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e9.../TheZaphod.jpg

http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e9...TheZaphod4.jpg

This is the potential of the Jolliff line Tiger:
http://www.ball-pythons.net/forums/s...ad.php?t=56126

Interestingly - the eye stripe widening and going up in the back of the head on the "normal" tiger is exactly what Zaphod has going on as well with his eye stripe (the "normal" head farthest to the left).

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Originally Posted by NickMyers03

Mojave or Spider!!

and keep back all the females :)

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Thanks Nick! I appreciate your input!

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Originally Posted by Adam_Wysocki

Robin,

I'm been producing some really smoking hot yellow bellies the last couple years from dark adult females. Heavy heavy checker board belly patterns and hot flames ... they're not the brightest yellow YB's in the world, but the intensity of their patterns and their contrasting darks are super hot in my opinion. I would go yellow belly on that girl and hope the black back is co-dom-ish ... it could make for a very cool odd ball YB baby or two.

Just some food for thought.

-adam

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That's good to know, Adam! Do you have any picture examples you can post here or PM to me?

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Originally Posted by Tosha_Mc

I vote YB :gj:


BTW - got a belly shot of that girl?

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Thanks Tosha - I don't have a belly shot of her, and I want to say it's pretty un-remarkable, but she's deep in shed right now, when she sheds out, I'll try to remember to get one of it!

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Originally Posted by rabernet

That's good to know, Adam! Do you have any picture examples you can post here or PM to me?

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Unfortunately, I don't have anything handy ... next time I'm taking pics I'll snap a couple for you.

-adam

Hey Robin, heres my opinion for what its worth, I was thinking Mojave until I realized how dark she really is, I was thinking she was lighter than that. So now its between the Tiger and the YB, for sure, and if it was me I would go with the YB because it should produce some stunning YB hatchlings! Then take that Tiger and pair it up with another female and get you some females to breed back to dad. Again, my opinion, take it for what its worth. :2cent:

My vote would be yellow belly! :gj: I think the tiger could potentially nullify one of her best features, which is that amazing black back. I'd rather see the tiger paired with a more banded girl. Whereas, I think if she managed to pull off some screaming black-backed yellow bellies.....yummy!!

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Originally Posted by rabernet

I thought about that - but I'm really working on selectively breeding, and I want to figure out what I think she will complement best.

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Only reason I brought it up is it doesn't seem like the big issue is being able to get girls ready. For us it just seems like some of our boys are completely lost and don't have the faintest idea what to do. Getting them motivated and going seems to be the hardest part to date for us. But the good news is out of 3 pairings we started on the 1st of the month two have already locked. Our big proven breeder male went to town in less than three hours and is still locked at around 36 hours so far! Our other one locked around noon today and is still locked. This is our second attempt to breed him and last time he showed no interest.

I kinda like the darker mojos.. The ones with the really dark back that fades into the lighter flames.. I think her pattern would look good on your mojo or a yb.. If it were me I would run them both through her.. I think if you have a female that would compliment two different morphs it can't hurt to have a mixed clutch..

Alan

I don't know if it counts as "advice" coming from someone who hasn't done any breeding yet, but here are my thoughts...

I think Winston is pretty much out. I'm sure you have other girls who are a better pairing for him.

For a spider I'd want a reduced girl who also has a lot of gold coloration. I know you have no shortage of the first, and Pretzel doesn't look very golden, so I'd say that is out also.

Mojave would depend on if you like darker or lighter colored mojaves. Part of what I like in mojaves is the colors of their dorsal spots and the contrast it creates, and so I wouldn't be as interested in a black back mojave.

The tiger might result in the black back of the female canceling out the banded pattern, as Judy pointed out. Or it might have a really interesting effect, which I believe Albey mentioned. So even if you don't try it this year, you might want to try that cross at some point just to see what happens.

I'd go with the YB. One thing I haven't seen mentioned is that YBs tend to have their white borders turn yellow. Pretzel doesn't have particularly white borders to start out with, at least based on that picture, so it might compliment the YB look.

I definitely agree to go with the selective breeding idea of carefully picking which male to put with each female. However, I think the way I will approach it is to keep a second choice in mind just in case the first male doesn't seem to be getting the job done.