Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I'm looking at 2 very pretty bp's that I would eventually like to breed once I am at that point. I was wondering what the big diff is between the 2 besides 16%. Is it worth dropping the extra $100 for that 16%? Also if someone can give me a link to this info and how it's figured out that would also be greatly appreciated.
1 more week til I get to bring home my first 2 bp's the excitement is overwhelming.

The 50% hets are made by breeding a 100% het with a non-het. The 66% hets are made by breeding two 100% hets together. It's all up to you if the extra money is worth the 66% het. I'd much rather have 66%'ers than 50%'ers though.

I'd prefer 66% as well, anyone would/should, but like he said, that's up to you. I'd suggest really looking into this more if you're just wrapping your head around what the probabilities mean. Any possible het breedings can create potential issues. The most prominent in my opinion-if you breed two POSSIBLE (50% or 66%) hets, and end up with nada, you have no idea if both of them are not hets, or just one of them ended up not being, while the other one is. So, to really have any sense of what's going on, I'd personally want at least a visual male to breed to poss. het females. With the small clutches, you could easily not get a given morph breeding two 100% hets together. I've seen 6 egg pastel clutches pop out only 1 pastel. Definitely do some research before you go spending money you end up wishing you had held onto and just saved up for definite hets or the actual visual morph. To save you some heartache down the road, there are some shady people out there, just like any other hobby/business. Don't jump on the killer deal, research who you're buying your hets from. That's one aspect of morphs that is way too inviting to scammers!!! Good luck with your new balls.

Here is a link to Markus Jayne's genetics page that explains the possible outcomes of various pairings (visually)and explains why they are termed 50%-66% etc. This is just one of many sites with good info on genetics.

http://www.ballpython.ca/what_get/recessive.html

Think out it in terms of flipping a coin...heads you get the gene, tails you don't. With a 50% het you only get to flip the coin once (for the 1 het parent) with a 66% het you get to flip it twice (once for each het parent). So it's not just a 16% difference you actually double your chances. The problem is you have to wait a few years to find out the results of the toss!

As the last post said, the best bet is to pair a possible het with a visual so you can tell what's going on. AND the surest way to win the game with possible hets is to buy several.
Good luck,
John

not to mention if you pair the possibles up to a visual, you will know for a fact that all the non visual babies are 100% het.
-----
www.bamreptiles.webs.com
www.facebook.com/bamreptiles

One way you might want to look at it is: How many more 50%ers can you buy w/the same amount of money? In other words, your odds would improve if you had 4 50%ers v.s. 2 66%ers. We all agree though, only you can make that call!

You are right but more exactly, you were right 5 years ago.

Now the price of possible hets are all the same. Actually, the possible hets are usually listed as normals.

I know a lot of breeders who just sell the possible to wholesale at the same price as normals, as they are more of a problem to sell etc... than anything else.

Things are different in high morph like the toffee, candy, desert ghost, etc... but there is only a small % of these.
-----
love this world, don't hate it.

thank you all for the info. I will go for the 66% het. if not the price isn't too much higher than this morph goes for anyway the het was just a bonus. now if my rack would only get here so I can bring my balls home from the breeder. I currently have a pic of the mojave as my wallpaper on laptop.

if you can, regardless of whether you choose 50% or 66%, buy more than 1 - and make them your females for the project. your male MUST be either 100% het or a viual of the morph.

when i started my albino project years ago, i bought one 100% het male from one breeder, and three 50% het females from another breeder - this way i know one of the parties definately carries the gene and it gives me better knowledge - after the eggs hatch - which females carry the albino gene.

all three bred and gave me clutches of 6-8 eggs. two clutches gave me albinos, one did not. for the price i paid, two out of three was fantastic - far cheaper than if i'd bought a 100% het female - and now i had two.