Proving a Poss Het...

[The Serpent Merchant]

I...don't...understand??
What would that prove? Absolutely nothing since all of the babies will be 100% hets no matter what...That will prove nothing of the mothers genetics

Unless you're talking about specifically just trying to get pieds. The post was about proving a possible het though....not inbreeding just to get pieds (which really isn't necessary anymore)

The point is that it's now pointless if the original female is a het or not, as you now have a 100% het female ready to breed.

If the original female doesn't prove out by the time you have a 100% het ready to go why even bother. A generation or two of inbreeding in reptiles doesn't lead to any negative effects 99% of the time.

[The Serpent Merchant]

Very true. But the offspring from the first clutch would all be guaranteed 100% hets since dad is a visual, and it wouldn't necessarily prove mom as a het.

But that's not the point. You now have a guaranteed 100% het ready to breed. The 50% het is now obsolete, and if the original female hasn't proven out yet chances are it's time to throw in the towel. Sure it's still possible, theoretically a het could never pass on the het gene. it's extremely unlikely but possible.

[MootWorm]

But that's not the point. You now have a guaranteed 100% het ready to breed. The 50% het is now obsolete, and if the original female hasn't proven out yet chances are it's time to throw in the towel. Sure it's still possible, theoretically a het could never pass on the het gene. it's extremely unlikely but possible.

That's not the point either lol. The point is to prove out the poss het.

[SnowShredder]

That's not the point either lol. The point is to prove out the poss het.

Exactly....thank you

[don15681]

my answer would be: 4.

if it really is a 100% het pied, your chance to miss out on one egg is 50%, for two eggs its 25%, for 3 eggs its 12,5%, and after 4 eggs, at 6,25%, i would write it off.
i mean if its lets say a lesser enchi possible het pied female and you want to breed lesser and enchi into pied you might still repeat the breeding to hit your lesser enchi 100% het pied. So there may be a good reason to continue.

if there isnt one, or if its really just a possible het pied female without other genes, i would stop after 4 eggs.

Also some people can make out het pied markers in possible het pieds and pick the ones that are most likely to be the real het pieds, which already casts more doubt on possible hets than would be the case with, lets say, albino.

ball pythons don't always go by the book. 2 years ago, I breed my clown male to a Mojave female. same odds as hitting on a 100% het to visual. I had 6 good eggs and all 6 hatched. I didn't get any mojaves and everything was just 100% het clowns. I hit the same odds as having all mojaves in that clutch. it happens, I've seen it!

[The Serpent Merchant]

That's not the point either lol. The point is to prove out the poss het.

But think of it this way. If you breed that 50% female every breeding season until the 100% offspring is ready to breed that's 3-4 clutches. Averaging 5 eggs per clutch that's 15-20 hatchlings. On average 7-10 of those should be visuals. If none of them are, it's time to give up. You now have a 100% ready to go, and you gave the 50% het girl more than enough chances to prove herself.

I understand what you are saying from a theoretical perspective, but we live in the real world... At the end of the day the purpose of proving out a 50% het is to produce visual offspring.

As I said previously It's possible that a het snake never passes on the gene in question, extremely unlikely, but possible. Technically you can't ever 100% prove that a 50% het is a normal. All you can do is look at things reasonably. 3-4 clutches should tell you what you need to know.

[MarkS]

I...don't...understand??
What would that prove? Absolutely nothing since all of the babies will be 100% hets no matter what...That will prove nothing of the mothers genetics

Unless you're talking about specifically just trying to get pieds. The post was about proving a possible het though....not inbreeding just to get pieds (which really isn't necessary anymore)

My apologies, I was just taking the question to the next logical step. The only reason to breed a pied to a possible het pied is to produce more pieds. And the best way to do that is to use multiple females. I personally like to use females that I've produced myself because then I can be 100% sure of their genetics.

The original question is difficult to answer, the odds really only work out with large numbers. Sure, you might expect to produce half pieds when breeding a homozygous animal to a heterozygous animal, but the small clutch sizes of ball pythons make the numbers statistically insignificant. Actually there is no way to disprove whether or not a snake is actually a het because the odds will never be reduced to zero. There will always be some fraction of a percentage of a possibility no matter how many eggs you produce that hatch normal hatchlings. As Satomi325 said, many breeders will give you a 3 clutch guarantee. However that guarantee still doesn't prove whether or not the snake is actually a het, it just means you can get your money back if you've had really really bad luck.

[MootWorm]

But think of it this way. If you breed that 50% female every breeding season until the 100% offspring is ready to breed that's 3-4 clutches. Averaging 5 eggs per clutch that's 15-20 hatchlings. On average 7-10 of those should be visuals. If none of them are, it's time to give up. You now have a 100% ready to go, and you gave the 50% het girl more than enough chances to prove herself.

I understand what you are saying from a theoretical perspective, but we live in the real world... At the end of the day the purpose of proving out a 50% het is to produce visual offspring.

As I said previously It's possible that a het snake never passes on the gene in question, extremely unlikely, but possible. Technically you can't ever 100% prove that a 50% het is a normal. All you can do is look at things reasonably. 3-4 clutches should tell you what you need to know.

Oh yeah, I agree 100%. Continuing to breed the poss het until her daughters are up to size would also fulfill the 3 clutches that someone else proposed. I wasn't saying anything about theoretical yield from clutches. I was just saying that breeding daughters back to dad would only prove that dad is a pied lol.

[OhhWatALoser]

Everyone is going to have different numbers, i would probably write it off as not het after 10 hatchlings, the odds are 1/1024

[Pythonfriend]

ok, maybe calling it off after just 4 eggs is a bit radical, but then, i dont see much value in proving out 50% possible hets, given that 100% hets are very cheap and producing a clutch takes much work and effort.

i mean, we are not talking about tri-stripe, atomic or sunglow here, just pied.


Maybe cut off when chances drop below 1%?

all misses:
1 egg: 50%
2 eggs: 25%
3 eggs: 12,5%
4 eggs: 6,25%
5 eggs: 3,125%
6 eggs: 1,56%
7 eggs: 0,78%

so after 7 misses in a row you drop below 1%. After 10 eggs, its below 0,1%, at 0,097%. After 14 eggs, we are below 0,01%. one in ten thousand. After 17 eggs, below 0,001%, remaining chance below one in 100000.

After 20 eggs, its below 1 in 1 million. So if it would be a het, after 20 eggs, it should be proven out and you should get a visual in 999999 cases out of a million cases.


Now you can decide if you want to call it quits when chances drop below 1%, or below 0,1%, or below 0,01%. That would be after 7, or 10, or 14 eggs.

i personally would call it off rather quickly, consider the female a normal, and not breed the piebald to the female, instead i would breed something like a killerbee or a pewter pinstripe to the female and consider her a normal. And raise up the 100% hets.