I think this is an interesting question. I have a spider (well a queenspin), and she is stunning. i took her in on a trade knowing she was tweaked, and trust me, she is tweaked. But, she still slams medium rats and still acts otherwise normal. Therefore the bigger picture is, is this condition, lowering the quality of life of that animal. If not, it may simply be seen as a "phenotypic" condition, and one that we choose to either like or dislike, just as we choose to like or dislike morphs. I was chatting to a friend about this very topic earlier in relation to breeding. I plan to pair my queenspin next season. The difference with me however is that I have absolutely no worries about euthanizing an animal that shows and extreme "spider" condition. If a friend wanted one as a pet, I may give that animal away, but I would not sell it. I may, in time, set up an experiment comparing age and sexed matched animals with and without the tweaking, to see how growth rate, feeding, and reproduction is effected. Might be a nice long term undergraduate research project in my lab. The other interesting thing is that it may relate to a condition comparable to humans, and therefore ball pythons with it may act as model organisms to study its effects and treatments. Think bigger picture.
Warren
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