So... I'm new here and can't say I know a lot about breeding Ball Pythons, but I know about breeding ethics especially with dogs (German Shepherds in particular.)
While I may be biased, I think spiders are an amazing morph of ball python (I currently only own one BP and it is a spider.) I understand that spiders are notorious for having a wobble to some degree, I also understand that in the VAST majority of spiders, this wobble does not affect the quality of life in the animal in any way.
Now I'm not saying that it should just be overlooked, but I think that the spider morph is one that is important enough (to the creation of other morphs) and beautiful enough on its own to be valued by the BP community. I simply do not see the point in bashing those who choose to breed the morph to the point of demonizing these people.
German Shepherds were brought up in an earlier post as having hip displasia and then someone else remarked that the dogs with the 'hip displasia gene' were not bred. This is simply not true, not because there are irresponsible breeders breeding animals with hip displasia, but because they don't know exactly what causes it. While they try to place dogs together with healthy hips, it does not always result in puppies with healthy hips and vice versa.
Hip displasia would be much less common by now if they knew how to prevent it. HOWEVER, instead of giving up cold turkey on breeds with a high incidence of hip displasia (which is most large breeds) there are many breeders that for the love of their breed are working hard to make improvements. It is also a disease that has varying levels of severity, some dogs may have near perfect hips (I've yet to see PERFECT X-rays but I suppose it is subjective) while some dogs are so crippled by displasia that they can not walk.
Basically what I'm trying to say is that, instead of being so negative about the morph maybe try to appreciate the amazing things that have come out of it and be hopeful for its future. I imagine any responsible breeder is working towards breeding healthy spiders with as little 'wobble' as possible. This is something I can appreciate and I think other BP lovers should try to appreciate as well.
I respect the breeders that are trying to improve the spider morphs and I don't think they should feel guilty about working with them. The same applies to those that work with caramels and any other morph with known issues. But I do believe that those who do work with these morphs should hold a higher level of responsibility to ensure that they are doing what they can to produce healthy disease-free animals (or as close to as they can get.) And I hope that there are breeders that are passionate enough about these morphs and hopefully some day we will see wobble free spiders and kink free caramels.
Reply With Quote