"If you breed recessive gene male to a normal girl you can still "back him up" with a codominant male like a spider. That way if all the babies look normal chances are the recessive male fathered the clutch. If you see spider in the clutch it's obvious the spider fathered the clutch. Spider (codominant) x normal = half babies spider and half babies normal. Pied (recessive) x normal. all babies look normal, but are 100% het pied. Hope this helps. Chris Hall"

With the above situation you have no idea if the normals are het or not. It is just a guess, even if there are no spiders in the clutch.

I have spoke with many people at shows that are selling hets, when I've asked about the parents and what was bred, sometimes they are hets and sometimes they are just possible hets. Some people believe a het to normal makes 100% hets, some believe het to het is 100% het, obviously neither of these breedings results in 100% hets. Other times there is the question of multiple males and not knowing for sure which male fathered which egg. These aren't people trying to hide anything, they admit what the breeding was, they are just incorrect in assuming they have 100% hets.

Mike I agree totally with what you said. There's a lot of things that could happen and you still wouldn't know who the father is like you get an 6 egg clutch and 4 die early in incubation and 2 "normals" hatch out. You would have no idea who did the deed. Or hatch out 6 eggs with the spider being the father and get all normals because you got killed on the odds. Or you could get a duel sired clutch and not know it and hatch out 2 spiders and 4 what appear to be normals hatch out. I should have taken more time to explain different scenarios. Truth is it's best to use 1 male and know what your getting. Chris


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