inbreeding...

[Meta]

new to breeding, so forgive my ignorance.

i have a pair of baby garters from the same mother. if i keep them and breed them later on, will there be complications or any problems from them mating?

[Bartman]

From what i understand no. Thats how they come up with morphs and all that. Their are arguments that in the long run their can be signs but i doubt that. The other side of the argument suggests that this happens in the wild all the time.

When I get a pair I try to get them from different lines, but if they happened to be siblings I wouldnt pay much attention. But thats just me.

[Linds]

Yes and No. In the wild, animals become stronger and evolve through inbreeding due to natural selection. The problems in captivity that arise with inbreeding is that we are no longer breeding the strongest specimens with the strongest specimens since natural selection is not in play. Animals with weak genes are unable to be successfully weeded out. So all in all, it may work to your advantage, but there is no real way of knowing ahead of time. If they are both outwardly strong, healthy, trouble-free specimens, I would say go ahead and pair them up in the future. However, if they produce offspring with undesirable qualities, you shouldn't continue to breed them in the future.

[Jonathan Crowe]

From what I understand, it takes repeated generations of inbreeding to cause problems in snakes. One generation of hot sweaty sibling sex isn't going to irrevocably blow up the gene pool.

But . . .

Let's say you breed your siblings and have offspring. Then you sell or give your offspring to someone else, who decides he has a male and a female and decides to breed them. After all, one generation of inbreeding won't hurt. So he breeds them. Then he sells his offspring to someone else, who decides to breed the siblings, because, after all, one generation of inbreeding won't hurt . . .

Somewhere along the line some fresh genetics will have to be added. If people always assume that it'll be someone else, we'll end up with lots of inbred bloodlines.

My take on this subject -- make of it what you will -- is that while a generation or two of inbreeding probably won't hurt, it's probably a <em>very</em> good idea to get unrelated breeding stock wherever possible -- especially if it's not that hard to find another unrelated bloodline, and even if it takes a little work.

Especially with captive bred stuff, it might not be a bad thing to assume that their ancestors might be a little inbred, and that their offspring will might be inbred once they leave your hands, so it just might be up to you to make sure that inbreeding doesn't go too far out of hand.

[gonesnakee]

I would recomend breeding stock from different sources. Read above post & think about how many times they may have been inbred prior without your knowledge or that of the person you recv. them from. I have worked with snakes that have been inbred too much before with very poor results, resulting in eggbinding, large infertile clutches & screwed up malformed babies. Why risk it when there are unrelated specimens available to you? I wouldn't, but heck if you want to breed brothers & sisters that came from brothers & sisters go hard, but don't be too disappointed when things don't work out in your favour. IMHO why risk it? Mark
P.S. there are differences between line breeding & just inbreeding also. Line breeding is usually done with say an Albino male & a bunch of unrelated common females & then the female het offspring may be bred back to their father or better yet their het 1/2 brothers from another clutch to create Albinos & more hets (66% pos hets if it was from het to het). Inbreeding is usually done by people too cheap to buy some unrelated stock that just keep using all their own offspring over & over.

[Invictus]

If you CAN outcross, do it. But with some species, it's hard if not impossible to get unrelated stock because of their rarity, CITES classification, etc. Line breeding as Mark mentioned above in order to produce hets that eventually produce certain morphs can be ok. But, sometimes you won't get the results you want. By the same token though, I agree with what Linds said as well about natural selection. If you have tough, hardy, superior specimens, you may be doing them a FAVOR by inbreeding.... the strong produce more of the strong, kinda deal.

Bottom line - tough decision. If you find it works for you, great. If you don't get the results you should, outcross or stop breeding that pair entirely.

[M_surinamensis]

Inbreeding can't introduce anything new to the gene pool, it merely reinforces what's already there. In more intense cases of inbreeding (like when establishing a recessive trait) everything in the original animal's genes is essentially compounded exponentially. If there IS a negative trait inherent in the source animals, it WILL eventually surface, usually not until long after it's too late to contain (example being bug eyes in leucistic texas rats) but if there are no negative traits, you won't have any problems. No matter how many times you inbreed.

[gonesnakee]

Good Points! Mark

[Simon Sansom]

I'm not sure if this is a valid point, but...
Aren't all living things "related" if you go back far enough in time...?

Cheers,

Simon R. Sansom

[infernalis]

I found this old thread and thought it was still a valid discussion, so here it is.

I have a few snakes that I know for a fact are inbred, some as much as F5.

Even though there is money to be made, I will not breed my albinos without first out-crossing to prevent any further deterioration of the gene pool.

One set I have I tracked backward, the guy I got mine from purchased a pair of siblings and bred them, going back one more generation that pair was born to siblings.

So I won't breed the ones I have, since it is impossible to go back any further and find out if there is deeper inbreeding or not.

My albino red sided garters are very pretty, but have bug eyes that anyone can spot without even trying.

[emseeKAY]

ive always wondered if there were any implications to do with inbreeding snakes, is this what causes the head wobble and neurological problems for the most part in many morphs?

[shaunyboy]

imo the general accepted rule with carpet breeders is breeding up to f3 is acceptable.f4 an beyond is generally frowned upon.unless your line breeding for a specific result.this imo would be acceptable if there wasnt loads of hatchlings born mutated etc,etc.like you say wayne its really hard to go all the way back and check how many generations of siblings have been bred together.i wish there were more people like yourself.people who will oubreed rather than just fling the siblings together and think what the heck we'll get loads of cash for all the albino's we produce.i think this post is a very valid and interseting one indeed.
cheers shaun

[infernalis]

ive always wondered if there were any implications to do with inbreeding snakes, is this what causes the head wobble and neurological problems for the most part in many morphs?

If the inbreeding is many generations, I would wager yes.

Even though the morph is virtually guaranteed, so are any problems.

I have a double het snake with a deformity, I will never breed her, I don't want to produce a litter of deformed snows, not enough money to even tempt me.

[shaunyboy]

id say its pretty much the same over here with the jaguar gene mutation.theres a lot more jun/jags and coastal jags on the go with mild to severe head wobbles to full corkscrewing around their tank.i personally would not breeed any jag showing signs of a neuro issue.glad to say my jags wobble free.but he's been my most treated snake out of all ive kept.he keeps having re occuring ri's.yet all my other carpets dont.since the original jag gene come from a single hatchling bred back to the parent then imo the jag bloodline is way too inbred.
cheers shaun

[emseeKAY]

sorry for this stupid question, but what does f1,f2,f3,f4 mean? Is that the number of the generation?

[marvelfreak]

:no:INBREEDING would be like sex with your sister gross and sicking.:no: Your only going to in up with freaks with deformitys somewhere down the line. Of course! That would explain a few people i know.:rolleyes: Animals don't know better, but we do. So why do it and even chances having inbreed unhealthy reptiles. Let's face it animals with defromity are week and don't live long.

[infernalis]

sorry for this stupid question, but what does f1,f2,f3,f4 mean? Is that the number of the generation?

Not a stupid question at all.

F! - unrelated parents
F2 - breeding siblings or son/mother father/daughter
F3 - breeding siblings of F2

and so forth.

There is a mathematical equation that can be used to predict probability of genetic morphs appearing in the offspring as well.

[Nafun]

Inbreeding is why all of my snakes are naturally occurring morphs. I think snakes are beautiful the way they are. Their coloring and pattern tell you a story about their environment and the history of the species.

Inbreeding is really just a lazy and cheap way of creating morphs without regard to the impact it will have on the species as a whole, or the quality of life of the snake.
Case in point? Dalmatians.

[infernalis]

I too appreciate "normals" but I do have this hangup on albinos also.

[Nafun]

Ever since I was a kid, I thought albino snakes looked gross. Still do. I'll take my snakes brown and black, not yellow and white thanks.

[infernalis]

Ever since I was a kid, I thought albino snakes looked gross. Still do. I'll take my snakes brown and black, not yellow and white thanks.


Personal taste is what makes the world go round ;)

However, these snakes are all 100% natural "normal" and representative of the species as found in nature.... Beautiful in my eyes.

http://www.danceswithreptiles.com/PG1/images/masubi.jpg

http://www.thamnophis.us/cherry/infernalis2.jpg

http://www.thamfriends.com/forum/picture.php?albumid=69&pictureid=1372

http://www.wildherps.com/images/herps/standard/05052102PD_Santa_Cruz_garter.jpg

[Aaron_S]

Inbreeding is why all of my snakes are naturally occurring morphs. I think snakes are beautiful the way they are. Their coloring and pattern tell you a story about their environment and the history of the species.

Inbreeding is really just a lazy and cheap way of creating morphs without regard to the impact it will have on the species as a whole, or the quality of life of the snake.
Case in point? Dalmatians.

You know, you sit here and say these things about morph keepers and breeders but yet you own a jungle carpet python. You do understand that Australia hasn't exported any new specimens for decades. This would mean that your gene "pool" isn't much more than a gene "puddle" at this point. I am talking of course legally exported animals. There might be a few that have "slipped" out.

[infernalis]

The same problem exists in Europe. Over there it is legal to posses San Francisco garter snakes.

Over here they are on the endangered species list making it a felony to capture, posses and export any live specimens.

The specimens that are all over the place there all originate back to one single pair that was exported back some 35 years ago from a zoo exchange.

[Nafun]

There's a big difference between a gene pool of a few thousand jungle carpet pythons and a few dozen of a rare morph.

[BlindOne]

I'm pretty sure that natural inbreeding has been occurring for millions of years with no catastrophic results. As long as the animals are turning out healthy, I see no problems with it. I really enjoy the morphs. I've got anerys, hypos, albinos and normals. All are gorgeous in their own way.

[Aaron_S]

There's a big difference between a gene pool of a few thousand jungle carpet pythons and a few dozen of a rare morph.

Which species are you talking about in regards to morphs? If we're talking the likes of corns, balls, boas etc. then it's only a matter of a few years before these rare morphs are outcrossed making the inbreeding a moot point.

[infernalis]

Which species are you talking about in regards to morphs? If we're talking the likes of corns, balls, boas etc. then it's only a matter of a few years before these rare morphs are outcrossed making the inbreeding a moot point.


Glad you brought that up, I have an outcross project I'm doing right now to try and get rid of the bugeye in my albino red sided snakes.

the down side is there is no "instant cash" with this, it takes years to do.

I will not breed a 12 month old snake, they are just not mature enough in my eyes, I prefer 24 months before I breed my snakes.

Some breeders I know of will "power feed" and try to accelerate growth, but again, to me that seems like the money factor is more important than animal health.

[dragunov.762]

yes the P is the parental generation and there children are the F1 and there children are F2 ect haha didn't see page 2 sorry

[shaunyboy]

Glad you brought that up, I have an outcross project I'm doing right now to try and get rid of the bugeye in my albino red sided snakes.

the down side is there is no "instant cash" with this, it takes years to do.

I will not breed a 12 month old snake, they are just not mature enough in my eyes, I prefer 24 months before I breed my snakes.

Some breeders I know of will "power feed" and try to accelerate growth, but again, to me that seems like the money factor is more important than animal health.


power feeding sickens me too mate.i'm sick of reading adverts over here that say. " buy this snake it is a year old and if its fed right you can breed it next year and get twice what you paid for it back off 2 hatchlings easy " these folk make me want to ....... sorry i wont post what im thinking as id more than likely get chucked off this forum.

cheers shaun

[Lankyrob]

I'm pretty sure that natural inbreeding has been occurring for millions of years with no catastrophic results. As long as the animals are turning out healthy, I see no problems with it. I really enjoy the morphs. I've got anerys, hypos, albinos and normals. All are gorgeous in their own way.

The difference with "natural inbreeding" and captive inbreeding is that in nature the weak/genetically defecient animals are likely to be predated or die off before breeding occurs leaving the "strong" genes to be shared rather than deficient ones

[infernalis]

Not to mention that F5 is not likely to happen in nature.

There is a colony of Melanistic garter snakes in Ohio that surely was created by natural inbreeding, since melanism is a morph.

[BlindOne]

The difference with "natural inbreeding" and captive inbreeding is that in nature the weak/genetically defecient animals are likely to be predated or die off before breeding occurs leaving the "strong" genes to be shared rather than deficient ones

Fair point but you see the weak ones die off in captivity also.

[Lankyrob]

SOme would admittedly - but also some that would definitely not make breeding size in the wild could be nursed to breeding size in captivity......

[infernalis]

I "salvage" wee runts every year. some make it, some do not.

In nature I'm sure these runts would never make it on their own.