Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I have heard a variety of opinions on the matter an would like to get the forums experiences.

Well, I am looking into a nice cross for my little lady.

One of the things I have come up with is the pairing of recessive genes may cause issues due to the gene being "weak".

I was having conversations about crossing weak to weak. So, what's your opinion on if the parents are albino/albino, be it sunglow, motley, etc, what is your experience with running into problems such as slugs, eye probs, etc?

So, crossing an albino whose parents are both albinos to a sunglow would be problematic? Others have told me that albino to anything is going to be equaly questionable as the gene is just by design prone to issues.

So is it best to outcross to say as double het albino " fill in the blank here" to the albino to loosen the gene up and diversify it or does it make a significant difference in crossing an albino to an albino when they aren't directly related in father daughter or siblings together?

Thanks.

The theory behind weak genes go something like this:

If 2 animals, siblings for example, come from a gene pool of weak genes, and you breed these animals together, then there is a higher probability of the offspring inheriting the same weak genes. These animals could be a double het sunglow and a sibling albino. If you outcross your breedings, then you are introducing new genetic diversity to the offspring thereby reducing the chance of inheriting weak genes from the same 2 parents in the same gene pool. However, if both parent animals are unrelated, and still come from separate weak gene pools, then there is still the chance for babies to inherit weak genes.
There are also certain genetic combinations that have proven to be fatal for certain breedings so far (i.e. super motleys).
Something else to consider is that genes can mutate within an embryo leading to specific issues (i.e. eye problems).

To answer your question more specifically with some of my own experience. Last year I bred 2 siblings together (double het x triple het) and got a litter 0f 21 live, 2 deformed, and 1 slug. I repeated the same breeding this season and got 2 live and 19 unfertilized eggs. Not sure what went wrong.

This year I bred an albino arabesque to a sunglow and got 18 live and 3 slugs. Then 2 babies died within the first week and a 3rd died after a regurge. All 3 that died were arabesque boas -possibly a weak gene, but there were no eye issues at all in the litter.

This year I bred a normal albino x a lipstick sunglow and got a litter of 15 live, 3 slugs, and 15 unfertilized eggs. There was one eye issue.

Breeding boas is always a gamble, and there are certain things you can do to try and improve a blood line. However, sometimes you just need to breed them and see what happens. Mother nature is the one who controls genetic mutations, recombination of DNA, and random assortment of genes during mitosis and meiosis.

I hope some of this helped.
-Anthony

Very interesting!

So it's a coin toss but I didn't expect to that extent. I have bred other animals in the past and low producers were normally just that or perhaps a general decrease with age.

Never a solid producer and the the following yr a reduction by 90%, etc...

Thanks!