interesting genetics idea...

**Russell** · 08-29-07, 03:21 PM

A friend of mine, who shall remain nameless, bred one of his hypo okeetees to an okeetee het hypo okeetee. And The results were
5 amels
7 Hypo Okeetees
2 Normals

His theory, is that by breeding hypos to each other long enough you get amels...

My theory, is he's got the amel gene swimming around in there somewhere and it popped up, despite never having shown up in this pure locality bloodline. Plus, surely some of those amels have to be homo for hypo as well. But anyhow, will take pictures of the babies when I visit. He asked if I would post this here. Frankly I think his ideas of, that if you breed hypos long enough to each other, enough generations, that you eventually breed out all the black, including in the eyes so that you get an amel. Which to me sounds rather absurd! So...let the games begin...

galenwbritt · 08-29-07, 03:35 PM

Originally Posted by Russell

A friend of mine, who shall remain nameless,

What cruel, cruel parents......poor guy.

I would agree with you, that amel is "floating" around somewhere in the mix. It is very weird to not have produced them before though. Any ideas on how many clutches/pairings/actual hatchlings had come to life before this discovery? Weird issue, I had never thought of that theory before about hypos breeding out all black.

Will be interesting to see what some of the "pros" have to say on this......will be waiting patiently.

G

**Serpwidgets** · 08-29-07, 06:11 PM

Ya, given how common amel is throughout the population, it's very likely that he had amel in there and didn't know it. If his hypothesis were true, there would be no on/off attribute to it. This just suddenly came out, and it's not like there's a spectrum of no melanin to some melanin. Instead there are amels and non-amels.

FunkyRes · 08-30-07, 09:47 AM

Originally Posted by galenwbritt

What cruel, cruel parents......poor guy.

LOL!

I would agree with you, that amel is "floating" around somewhere in the mix.

Definitely.
For one thing - hypo is a completely different gene pair than amel.
I suppose it is theoretically possible for a hypo gene to mutate into something else - but if it mutated into amel (a very rare occurrence) then it would not be allelic with the known amel lines.

**Russell** · 08-30-07, 01:35 PM

so, we should tell him to cross one of these amels to a different amel from a diff bloodline, and if he gets more amels, then he's got nothing more than...amels... right?

FunkyRes · 08-31-07, 01:24 AM

Yes - which is highly more likely than a new amel line.
If he does have a new amel line, that would be news.

Recessive genes though can pop up after staying hidden for several generations - as both parents have to be carriers for it to pop up.

They even stay hidden in line breeding.

IE - M1 is het amel - FM1 is not.
Hold back M2 and FM2 from pairing

Chances are only 1 in 4 that both M2 and FM2 are het - so they probably will not make any amel babies, but chances are 1 in 2 that one of them is het amel - so there's a good chance some of their young will be het amel.

Keep line breeding syblings and 1 of 2 things will eventually happen - either you'll eventually pop out an amel revealing the gene in the line, or you'll eventually lose the amel gene in the line.

nathanielehlert · 08-31-07, 05:44 AM

just cause they carry the genes does not nessicary mean that the offspring will show it genetics are a game of chance

**MohrSnakes** · 08-31-07, 06:18 PM

Originally Posted by Russell

despite never having shown up in this pure locality bloodline..

Well, is this pure locality bloodline where the hypo originated as well? If not, to get hypo in the "pure" okeetee snakes you would have had to breed a hypo into it. Chances are...that is where the amel snuck in. I very much doubt breeding hypos together for long periods of time would give you amels....

Then again...that explains what I'm seeing in the lavas and sunkissed!

......Just kidding!

</IMG>

**Russell** · 09-01-07, 05:09 AM

well, it comes down to who do you trust? He claims he's never bred anything into his Okeetee lines, and that he's kept them pure. That is only breeding locality Okeetees to locality Okeetees. This is what he tells me, and that these hypos just showed up in time. And the original two were a bit darker than the hypo okeetees he's seeing now that are from those. And so now that he's getting amels out of these lighter hypos, he's got it in his head that if he breeds hypos down the line long enough, he gets amels.

My feeling? This guy has SO many animals, it's easy to forget something was outcrossed and not pure locality. And eventually those genes showed up. Yet on the other hand knowing how locality specific he wants to be, I do wonder if maybe he's right. But locality purity aside, the rules for genetics still act the same regardless if they are locality! These are hypos that carried the amel gene, period. I do recall him telling me he got a ghost a couple years back out of one hypo Okeetee pair... So frankly I'm waiting for the, oh Russ, I got snows this year... pure Okeetee snows...

Did this fellow keep records? No not really. The only thing constant in life is change. I'm sure with all that goes on, something slipped into the line. I also recall a time he was talking to Kathy, and she straightened him out on his calling some normals Okeetees het snow. Cause he'd bred an Okeetee to a Snow... It really comes down to having a true understanding of genetics. This guy is a good breeder, and caretaker of his animals. And he truly believes he's got genetics down. Even after I've sent him one of Chuck's books!

I just have the information he as the breeder has given me, and I just have to take that information, and apply what I know about genetics and go from there. I think Kathy is doing best by calling Okeetees, Okeetee phase, rather than trying to claim purity of line. Yes it's great to try to keep a line "pure" but eventually one has to outcross! I certainly don't have all the answers! But this line of Hypo Okeetees that I have is different enough for me that I want to continue working with them, they are very beautiful in my book. I know they are Hypo A from a test cross done a number of years back. I am trying to keep them seperate at this time from outside blood. But I question that the line is quite as pure as the breeder thinks they are!

Yet on the other hand, he get's pretty defensive when told he's off track! I tried to tell him what I knew... Oh well, that's why it's up to us to learn as much as we can, cause we might not be able to change someone elses thinking despite the truth!

Originally Posted by MohrSnakes

Well, is this pure locality bloodline where the hypo originated as well? If not, to get hypo in the "pure" okeetee snakes you would have had to breed a hypo into it. Chances are...that is where the amel snuck in. I very much doubt breeding hypos together for long periods of time would give you amels....

Then again...that explains what I'm seeing in the lavas and sunkissed!

......Just kidding!

</IMG>

FunkyRes · 09-01-07, 06:39 AM

Well - one of things about Okeetee is that there are plenty of locality snakes from the Okeetee hunt club that do not exhibit what we in the trade call Okeetee phase - and there are also places a good distance from the Okeetee hunt club where snakes are found that match what we call the Okeetee phase.

I believe Sunkissed is a hypo that came out of Okeetee and I think Lava may also have come out of Okeetee but I'm not sure. Whether they came out of hunt club locality Okeetee or not I haven't a clue - but on fieldherpforum there have been several wild hypos found and posted, so hypo genes do not seem to be that terribly uncommon in wild populations of corns. Most people on that forum release what they find, but it would be interesting to test wild caught hypos against existing known genes (hypo, lava, sunkissed, ultra) to see if they are new or not.