Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hey all, I'm in the midst of writing a dissertation on the "Paradox" reptiles that are appearing in the past few years and was looking to see if any of you are willing to contribute anything you have.

As of right now, I'm 99% sure that I have an answer to what is going on here, but have been unable to find much information reporting this phenomenon in reptiles, so that is why I'm turning to you all out there.

If you have any information, please email me at mahlonslee@yahoo.com.

Information I'm looking for is as follows if you can include it:
1) DOB for the animal, description of animals parents, anything odd that occurred during incubation.
2) Results from breeding the animal (Paradox Albino X het albino = albino?)
3) Any changes in the appearance of the animal as it ages
4) And lastly, any pictures of parents, the animal themselves, and progeny (kids)

Thanks again, feel free to post any other questions here or email me, I will also be posting this on other forums.

And lastly, just wanted to say that this information will be kept private until my paper is released to the general public so no fear of me dropping the ball(no pun intended lol)on any of your top secret projects. Also if you contribute to the project I will be willing to let you know my theory as to what is going on, and am willing to hear anyone elses ideas.

Thanks again,
Dan Slee

Did you see that TV special? Now that genetic testing is getting more common they are finding cases where birth mothers are not testing to be a genetic parent. It turns out that sometimes twins merge into one and different parts of the body will genetically be each twin. The kids are from the twin whose genetic material contributed the most to the testis/ovaries but when they go to test it might turn out that the other twin's material contributed most to the blood or skin cells sampled.

Maybe paradox ball pythons are made by dissimilar twin embryos merging into one. Maybe it happens a lot but until you start breeding hets capable of making radically different looking offspring you don't get a mix that shows up (i.e. two normal twins would still produce a normal merge but albino and non albino produce something more interesting).

Randy,

You are so close you should be able to smell the answer from here, but here is a hint.

Mythical creature with many heads and a different body.

Google might just be a friend, and help you out.

Dan

You think they're Chimeras... interesting theory, and it makes sense. Sounds like a good paper.

>>Randy,
>>
>>You are so close you should be able to smell the answer from here, but here is a hint.
>>
>>Mythical creature with many heads and a different body.
>>
>>Google might just be a friend, and help you out.
>>
>>Dan

I wonder what happens when opposite sex snake embryos merge. Might be to blame for those ones that are hard to sex. Sure hope that's not the case with an interesting looking "girl" I've had so much trouble getting to produce eggs for years and years.

I don't know, I guess that would depend on when during development gender is determined and when the germ cells become fused. Here is a great webpage that I stumbled over while looking for more on this subject.
Chimeras

Randy!

I saw that show-said the same to Dave-maybe it is the answer-easy to test though. I have those paradox albino ball pythons and offspring, so I'll get some sheds and see what we can find!

In the mean time-the sandboa paradox albinos are I think the only proven recessive trait-and are awesome-lot's of fun-no two alike-easy to maintain. If you like the paradox these are neat snakes.

I love medical docudramas-now you know what I watch while cleaning snakes!

Tracy/VPI
paradox sandboa proven genetic trait

So is paternity testing now available for ball pythons? How much does it cost?

This chimera/merged twin thing throws a bit of a wrench in it. Maybe the shed will test out genetically the same as the sperm or egg cell that was contributed to the offspring so you might have to test a while to confirm. Maybe best with a female paradox and offspring so you can be sure sperm retention isn't to blame if you find an offspring that doesn’t match the parent.

learned that stuff on CSI too.........chimeras.......
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Someone at work was telling me about the CSI episode today. The show I caught the last half of was something else called "I am My Twin" or something like that. Sounded like it took them quite a while to figure it out – almost took some lady’s kids away. It's hard for people who just _KNOW_ the simple answer (abducted children, in vitro fertilization) to find the new out of the box explanation of the sometimes messy way the world really works.

Best shows out there right now...

YAY GRISSOM!
And there is that Herp lady that makes cameos too... The Asian lady. She's cool.
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-Ohh, what a Lady-

Balls for Life, Baby!

siblings be ok? I know that if the animal in question is a W/C then obtaining "branched out" siblings of the Parents is out of the question. Duh!
In these cases would extensive family tree testing be a necessary thing?
The show was great btw, Sundays On Disc.Health/Anim.Planet channels are great!
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In Loving Memory of the best Brother God gave me
Sgt. Arnold DuPlantier II
(Army National Guard, Charlie Rock Co.)
06/03/1979-06/22/2005
Support Our Troops

The main thing would be testing the paradox and it's for sure offspring (for this reason it would be best if it was a female paradox to eliminate the possibility of sperm retention or parthogenisis). Even then you would only see something strange if you happened to sample a part of the paradox that had a different genetic makeup than the reproductive organs. It would be hard to prove but now that we know of the possibility it's something paradox owners could look into. I suppose maybe they could also run a comparison of tissue samples from the albino vs. the black areas of the snake's skin - maybe that could diagnose a chimera.

Haven't received a single email of anyone offering any help, so I'm thinking that my paper is going to have to wait, great site below btw.

http://arbl.cvmbs.colostate.edu/hbooks/genetics/medgen/chromo/mosaics.html

Also just wanted to clear up, seems to me that it is much more likely that mosaicism is much more likely the cause of these paradox animals, and not a chimera action, but it will take some time to test. Working on acquiring some paradox sand boas to run some tests on, but personally I believe this "proven" paradox mutation is much more similar in fact to dalmation spotting, and that the animals in question may not in fact be albinos.

Well goodluck, and if anyone decides they want to contribute to my study of this facinating occurrence, feel free to drop me an email or post here.

Dan