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I went to a show this past weekend & seen an old friend who approached me as soon as I walked in the door w/ a litter of Ball Pythons he had just hatched out the day before. This was his first clutch of eggs he's ever hatched & was obviously excited but confused about what he had. He bred a Pastel male to a normal female & was confused about the variation in the litter. I have been to this guy's place, seen his collection & couldn't be more happy to help out if I could so I looked in the tub then at my friend w/ a grin. I said "You're killing me here!" He said "I really don't know what's goin' on - help me out." I just looked at him again & repeated myself. Another Ball breeder was walking by & I asked him to look at this litter & tell my friend what he thought happened. My friend couldn't take the anticipation of the verdict so I told him what he had. In the tub was female wild-type, three female Pastels, one male Ghost, & one male Ghost Pastel!!!! What are the odds that the male Pastel (sire) was a Het. Ghost, the female was a Het. Ghost & they were compatible??? Crazy huh?? Not bad for a first-timer.......I told him to buy a lottery ticket on his way home as he went back to the table to tell his misses w/ tears welling up in his eye.

that was indeed inspirational. Talk about having the ball python gods smile down on someone. I enjoy hearing stories like that...definitely gives all of us hope and inspiration.

Thanks for sharing.
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MichaelRehker
"Which of us has not been stunned by the beauty of an animal's skin or its flexibility in motion?"
--Marianne Moore

Hi,

Thanks for the story, that was truly amazing. Take care.

Best Wishes,

Tony

L.A.R.

Lets see the pics and I want to know where that pastel was from!

As soon as they shed. I'll have my buddy Aj(the owner)Take some pics.

and so much better than the ol " the market is gonna crash!" posts. If you can contact that person please ask him to post pics of the litter. Too cool! Tom Stevens

If het ghosts where randomly distributed at 1 in 50 in the wild it would result in 1 in 2,500 random pairs being het ghost X het ghost and 1 in 10,000 ch babies being ghosts. Out of the annual harvest of 150,000 wild-bred ball pythons you would expect about 15 ghosts. Does that sound reasonably close to what comes out of Africa each year? Of course it's hard to account for non random breedings due to localized inbreeding but my point is that het ghosts might not be that uncommon in the imported babies.

Where did he get his male pastel? I know someone who bought a pastel male that was 50% chance het ghost and he wasn't told about the 50% chance until later. I think enough people are working on that combo that the odds of a male pastel being het ghost are probably higher than the also unexpectedly high odds of a random normal female turning out to be het ghost (was she selected for a light appearance?). It's still very lucky but maybe only 1 in 1,000 - 2,000 lucky and not lottery lucky.