Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I posted this accidentally in the boa forum already! OOPS, LOL ..

Anyway I really need to do some more reading on genetics, Ive got a basic understanding dominant and recessive, homo x norm = 100% het, het x het = 25% homo,50% het 25% norm, ect, ect.

Codominant throws me off, and figuring outcomes of litters from DH animals.

But my main question is whats the deal with pastels? I noticed in the classifieds that someone breeding a pastel female to a normal male produced, obviously, pastels and normals ... but wouldnt the sibling normals born alongside the pastels be het for pastel?

And why were there any pastels produced from that litter in the first place, they should all be hets?

Im assuming that pastels are NOT a genetic mutation of some sort, just a strain of highly colored norms leading to only certain hatchlings having this trait?

Are Pastels are just brightly colored normals? I know Im missing something....

Much appreciated!!

Yes you are missing this. Pastels are co-dominant which means breeding to a normal should give you 50% pastel and 50% normals. Obviously this is what it "should" be but with ball python clutches especially since they are small..you could get 4 eggs of 2 and 2 or you could get all pastels or no pastels. Its a little gamble but thats the best part about co-dominant traits...breed them to a few normals to increase your odds. They ARE a genetic morph and you could say the "hets" produced are the pastels in that they carry the trait to produce super pastels when bred to another pastel. Then you "should" get 50% pastel and 50% super. Here is the product of a normal to a pastel.

That makes sense, so pretty much the pastels produced from a pastellxnorm breeding are the ones carrying the gene, they just happen to be visual also.

So in breeding a pastel to a pastell, you say 50% pastel/50% super P. - WHats the process of proving one of these 50% supers true? Breeding the suspected super to a normal and getting all pastelS? ("Super = Dominant? Correct?)

Thanks a ton!

I think your still a bit confused. If you were to breed a pastel to another pastel, you would get 25% normals, 50% pastels, and 25% Super Pastels. Picture the pastels as being "Hets" for the super pastels... Same odds. You might want to check out some of the "genetics" web pages that some of the bigger breeders have, they are very helpful. Hope this helps.

Yes..I think I made it confusing in my original...you would get some normals unless it was pastel to super..then I believe you should get all pastel or above...but even I am a little confused with that stuff and i dont know what or if anything has been done with that yet. Either way...co-dominant traits should give you half and half...same as spider if you breed with a normal you "should" get half spiders. And I have no idea whats going on with mojave now..it is co-dominant but its holding some trait for lucy or something...Its getting almost like fasion keeping up with this stuff.

Pastels are hets for Super Pastel....
Super Pastel is the homo form of Pastel...so when a Super is bred to a normal....all are "hets".

A Pastel to normal- 50% Pastel and 50% Normal.
Pastel to Pastel- 50% Pastel 25% Normal 25% Super Pastel
Super Pastel to normal- all Pastel
Super Pastel to Pastel- 50% Pastel 50% Super Pastel
Super Pastel to Super Pastel- all Super Pastel
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Luke Martin
Bronze Serpent Reptiles

So would the supers look different than the pastels? Or would the supers look the same as the pastels, but simply be homo?

Supers have alot more intense coloration....you can tell by what they look like for sure....
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Luke Martin
Bronze Serpent Reptiles

Thats what I was thinking but I did not know if someone proved something from super to super...I did not know if it was worth peoples time anymore. Even I was getting confused in this thread..not to say I am a genius but this is something i should know. lol.

Howdy, I will try to clear this up in nice normal english for you. A pastel is a snake with 1 pastel gene, and 1 normal gene. This means it is actually a "visual het" for super pastel. The single gene is enough to color the snake differently then a normal. Now a super pastel has 2 pastel genes (Zero normal genes) producing a radically different color than a normal. A normal has 2 normal genes (Zero pastel genes) and so would appear just like any other BP. Now when you breed a pastel to a normal, you get (statistically) 50% hatchlings with 1 pastel gene and 1 normal gene, and 50% with 2 normal genes. Hence you have 50% visual pastels, otherwise known as "visual Hets". Now when you breed 2 pastels you have more pastel genes to figure in. As stated in a previous post in this thread, you end up with 25% supers, 50% pastels, 25% normals. All "co-dominants" work this way. "Co-doms" are really just visual hets, an incomplete set of genes that produce something differetn than normals, but not complete for the gene. Does this help?

I was just as confused as you were a few months ago, so I just kept reading more and more web sites about morph breeding. I found this Nerd web site really help me to understand the pastel gene.

http://www.newenglandreptile.com/genetics_codom.html

kyle