Reptile & Amphibian Forums

i have 0.1 albino ruthvens and 1.2 mex mexs. also 1.1 thayeri. and i want to creat albinos. obviously you cross the mex or thayeri to the ruth. but then do you cross it back to the ruthven, to another half mex half ruthven or something else? and will they all look like mex mexs still? if anyone knows i would appreciate it.

no albinos of other species or subspecies can be "made" from ruthveni or other existing pure albino species or subspecies. (note ruthveni and triangulum and mexicana are different species, if i'm not mistaken)

you can create babies some of which will LOOK like a different species or subspecies, but they're always (they and all subsequent generations) hybrids (in the case of diff species) or intergrades (in the case of naturally occurring subspecies crosses) that need to be identified as "mexicana x ruthveni", for example. Doesnt' matter how many times you might breed them back to the new species/subspecies. And for generations you'll get offspring that resemble each of the parent species/subspecies and various points in between.

the methodology is to cross an albino of one species/ssp X a normal of another; the babies are all theoretically het/amel. Crossing the babies back to each other produces clutches 1/4 of which (over a large sample) will be amels. You can then cross the ones that look most like whatever you want them to look like back to each other. Once you get amels you could heighten the percentage of the one species' genetic influence by crossing the amel X a normal of the desired species. You would again get hets, still NOT pure of that species, but more strongly influenced by that species than before, and you could again cross the het babies to each other, keep the 1/4 of albino babies and select the ones that look most like the desired parent species, and so on. but it's important to understand no matter how far down this path you go, you never achieve species or ssp "purity". On the other hand, in fairness to those who do this between subspecies with adjoining ranges, the intergrades in that case are as pure in theory as the animals along the intergrade range in the wild. My personal recommendation is to enjoy the beauty of the natural animals you have, relish and value the fact that they're a naturally-occurring animal, and hope for the day a pure albino shows up (i have a nagging memory that may have already happened with mex mex, i'm sure someone will remind us if that's the case--so you may just have to be patient til prices come down, and then you can enjoy the thrill of breeding true, pure mex mex albinos.

peace
terry

>>i have 0.1 albino ruthvens and 1.2 mex mexs. also 1.1 thayeri. and i want to creat albinos. obviously you cross the mex or thayeri to the ruth. but then do you cross it back to the ruthven, to another half mex half ruthven or something else? and will they all look like mex mexs still? if anyone knows i would appreciate it.