Looking to breed something special

ladyluck · 09-09-04, 09:47 PM

Okay, here is the deal. I have 1.1 normal BP's right now. I have some extra cash and am entertaining the idea of picking up a morph of sorts to breed.
I am window shopping at present to see what is available and would like to see what I can produce.
The question I have is that I dont quite understand the whole 'HET' thing. If I get a pair of albino hets, or a pair or pastel hets, what would the offspring be? Am I right to say 1/4 possible albino or pastel?
Senario two whould be to just get a pastel or albino outright and breed with a normal BP. What would the offspring be in that case?
Also, femals are more expensice than males, is this because the change of having morph offspring is higher?
If someone could answer these questions for me, it would be much appreciated.
I have bred normals in the past, and they seem to be a cinch to do. Is it harder with morphs?

Thanks for the info.

Also, anyone selling morphs right now for a reasonable price I would be interested in hearing about. I just moved into a new house and have a room that is going to be stricktly for herps.

Best regards,

K.

Artemis · 09-09-04, 10:32 PM

Im no breeder hon so I cant speak from any personal experience, but here are a couple of links that might help answer your questions. Good luck!

Artemis

http://www.supersnakes.com/gwiz.htm

http://www.reptilemorphs.com/article1.htm

Matt · 09-09-04, 10:40 PM

it depends on what type of gene you are dealing with....

albinism is recessive, which means at the locus on the gene which corresponds to albinism you need to have two recessive alleles to actually get an albino. A het is a snake that has one of those alleles but not both. So, if you breed two hets together, statistically you should get 1/4 normals, 1/4 albinos and 1/2 hets. The problem is that you cant tell the hets from the normals, so you will recieve 3/4 that are 66% chance of being het.

Pastel is totally different. This is a Co-Domiant gene, so you can breed a pastel to a normal and statistically you should get half normals and half pastels.

hhw · 09-10-04, 12:09 AM

Firstly, I would recommend that you purchase a morph you are actually interested in. I think it's important to keep things fun as much as possible, which is much more likely to be the case when you truly enjoy the animals you are working with.

On the other, as much as I would truly enjoy a mojave, they are quite out of my price range at the moment. Fortunately, I am also a big fan of pastels, which is why I decided to pursue that project. The good thing about working with a codominant gene (or more accurately incomplete dominance for pastels), is that you can breed a pastel to a normal and get pastels in the very first generation of offspring. In the case of pastels, pastels are the het form of the super pastel. Therefore, there is no such thing as het for pastel, as pastel itself is the het form, it's just visible. This is the difference between incomplete dominant and recessive genes, as hets for recessive genes look the same as normal ball pythons.

If you decide you're more interested in albinos, keep in mind that both breeders will need to carry the gene for albinism if you want to produce albino offspring. When working with recessive genes, I think it's important to start off with 100% hets or the morphs themselves. There's just too much guesswork going on, and if neither is a definite het it will take numerous breedings to see if one or both are lacking the gene if you don't get albinos right away. Of course, if you don't mind just producing normals, possible hets are a less expensive way of getting into morphs. Although in my opinion, the time and resources you will expend will make it more than worthwhile to start with definite hets from the start for a less expensive morph like albinos.

justinO · 09-10-04, 10:07 AM

the het thing has been explained a few times in the last couple weeks..... hopefully this will answer your questions:

genetics post

Getting the actual morph will give you different outcomes: pastel bred to a normal will give you some morph babies. albino bred to a normal will give you all 100% hets.

I would think the reason that females are more expensive is quite obvious: they have the babies.

Morphs as far as i know are no different than normals to breed, so that shouldn't be a problem.

As far as price, check the classifieds here, I can pretty much assure you that this is the cheapest you will ever find morphs. Anything lower than the offers here I would consider sketchy!

good luck!

Jessy

smeagel · 09-10-04, 10:23 AM

buy a pastel, it is the best investment you will ever make. there are soooo many different combinations you can make with a pastel and other morphs, as well as different paterns with in the pastel depending on the normals pattern u bredd with it.

latazyo · 09-10-04, 11:01 AM

just to add that het means heterozygous

ladyluck · 09-10-04, 11:15 AM

I was looking at some of the NERD line pastels. Those have some pretty cool patterns. Would it be worth the trip?

justinO · 09-10-04, 12:08 PM

depends where you live! If it's too far, I've heard they are really good with shipping, so you wouldn't have to worry.

If you don't want to go "brand name" for a pastel, you can find someone local that might have a beautiful one for sale! And remember you can always request pictures first.

Jess

ladyluck · 09-10-04, 01:10 PM

See here's what I dont get. People post ads for snakes and they dont post a picture. WASTE OF TIME!
Others not only have no picture, but dont state where they are located.
I think the two things that should be mandatory in the classified ads are those two things.
If you have something for sale DO IT RIGHT, or dont bother. I wont even contact people that dont have a picture or location in their post.

justinO · 09-10-04, 01:27 PM

but at the same time, you don't have where you live in your profile, "in the clouds" doesn't help much! I *think* you are in the states, but it would be easier for people to help if they knew which country you are in & where.....
also, if you want to hear from people who are offering, they need the same info from you. Sellers in Canada will probably not want to contact a buyer in the states and vice versa, because of all the cites and paperwork involved.

But I agree, if someone is selling an animal but doesn't want anyone to know where they live, there is something fishy about that. And your info is posted with all boards, so a poster would know that their city is not listed. It's a HUGE pain in the a$s.

ladyluck · 09-10-04, 02:38 PM

If I was selling something I would state both where I live and a picture of the animal. I have nothing to sell, so I don't need to post where I live.
I live in Ottawa Canada.

mykee · 09-10-04, 03:55 PM

Ladyluck, if you live in Canada, NERD will not ship north of the border for any order under $2500 U.S. I believe. Scks, I know. BUT there are some great pastel breeders here in Canada where you can get GREAT stock from, (I would definitely suggest a Graziani pastel over a NERD Line.) You can contact Jeff Favelle, Mark Mandic, Corey Woods, David Kwok, (me, but I'm all sold out this year, sorry) there are others, I'm sorry if I forgot you... Good luck.

Quote:

"Morphs as far as I know are no different than normals to breed.."

Jessy; for the most part, I would agree with you, but ask someone who owns pieds that same question....

ladyluck · 09-10-04, 04:37 PM

Does anyone have any available in the Ottawa area?
If you read this post PM me.
I would prefer to see the snake in person before spending a bunch of cash on one.
Pictures can be modified to look brighter than they actually are.
I would have no problem driving to Totonto or Montreal to find a quality animal.
Thanks!

mykee · 09-10-04, 07:03 PM

Most people trust a pic to purchase an animal. Good luck seeing one in person before you purchase. IF you buy from a reputable breeder, "picture modification" won't be an issue. I have bought animals from the states just by pics. If you plan on breeding, the animal that you buy will only be a very small part of the characteristics and looks of it's offspring. I've had terrible looking adults give me great looking offspring, and vice versa.