Hey everyone,
I haven't posted in forums for a while since I was pretty busy finishing up my bachelor in biology, but I wanted to share my experience proving out three 50% possible het. Toffees I purchased from Craig Stewart at The Urban Reptile back in 2012.
Being quite limited budget wise, I decided that the best way to prove these three females out was to buy an Albino male to produce some Toffinos since a Toffee male was out of the question $$ and a het. Toffee male would leave me unsatisfied if all the offspring came out looking normal since I would only have a 25% chance per egg of hitting a Toffee IF the female did carry the gene.
I finally got eggs from two of the three females this winter and crossed my fingers for 53 days until I could no longer wait and decided to cut the eggs. The first two eggs I cut from the first clutch of six were normal and my hopes were starting to fade. When I cut the third egg and peeped in, I saw white, but I didn't want to let myself believe I had hit a Toffino so I assumed I was just looking at a normal belly. A little taunting made the little guy move and I saw the hint of yellow I was looking for!!
I was so happy I almost cried, and quickly got to cutting the remaining three eggs. Three more Toffinos!!
About 20 days later the second clutch of seven was due and as I opened the incubator to go check on the eggs I saw a little yellow head poking out!! Another Toffino and another mother with the Toffee gene! I cut the remaining six eggs and they were all normal. I can’t say I wasn’t a little disappointed with the odds, but the important thing is that the mother proved out and I now have two 100% het. Toffee females and one left to be proved out.
With all this luck, there is perhaps one lesson we can all draw from this. No, odds can’t be beaten, and I was just as likely to have two expensive normal females on my hands as I was to have two bargain priced het. Toffees. But what is more interesting is that out of seven eggs with a 50% chance of being Toffinos, I hit only one. Had the mother not laid that seventh egg, I would have probably dismissed the female as being a normal and sold a breeder het. Toffee female for 100$. After all, the odds of hitting 6 normals without a single Toffino would have been 1 out of 64 and that is probably enough for most of us to consider ourselves beat. So don’t lose hope and give your possible hets. a second chance even if they don’t prove out the first time…
Thanks for looking,
Phil @ P3Morphs
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