Quote Originally Posted by paulh View Post
IMO, het lesser and het mojave makes it sound like two independent gene pairs, one made up of a lesser gene and a normal gene and the second made up of a mojave gene and a normal gene. Either lesser/mojave or het lesser/mojave sweems acceptable to me. Best of all is "a gene pair made up of a lesser gene and a mojave gene."

Please reread the definitions of homozygous and heterozygous in my earlier post. Whether a normal gene is present is irrelevant. All that matters is whether the two genes in the gene pair are the same or different.

Part of the quote reads, "A lesser/mojave BEL animal therefore, as we know, can only pass on either the lesser or mojave gene to it's offspring." That is true. A lesser/mojave ball python produces two different types of sperm (or eggs). One type has a mojave gene and the other type has a lesser gene. A het albino ball python also produces two different types of sperm (or eggs). One type has a normal gene and the other type has an albino gene. A homozygous albino ball python only produces one type of sperm (or egg). All have an albino gene. The number of types of sperm (or eggs) tells us whether a gene pair is homozygous or heterozygous. So a lesser/mojave ball python has a heterozygous gene pair.


So a gene pair made up of two Russo genes or two mojave genes is het leucistic? This does not compute.

I see where your confusion came from, I'll clarify my above statement.

I'm referencing the fact that while the lesser/mojave BEL animal is both het lesser and het mojave, since they are allelic pairs that the animal could also be considered a homozygous leucistic animal because if it were to be bred either the lesser gene or the mojave gene that gets passed on is still a leucism complex gene, whether it be the lesser half or the mojave half.

So for example, let's take the variable out and use a super lesser, it is homozygous lesser or a "BEL" and will pass on lesser no matter what. So any offspring will be "het lesser" or "het leucistic".

But if we take that "het lesser" and breed it to a "het Mojave" it can still produce a BEL. So while the lesser/mojave BEL may be "het lesser" and "het mojave", it is still a homozygous leucistic animal.

So a double lesser, or any other double BEL complex gene, would still be homozygous lesser, or whatever gene, but they are also homozygous leucistic animals.

It's confusing because once you start adding allelic pairs to genetics it surpasses your card exercise in complexity. While the cards example still works, an allelic lesser/mojave BEL animal is both a double het for it's respective individual genes, as well as homozygous for the allelic combination that those 2 genes make.