Lesson Learned

We purchased an adult female patty about a year and a half ago at the Show here in Hamburg from a rather large breeder who I shall not name. She is gorgeous, and very docile, "Spirit" quickly became one of my favorites. The last 3/8 to 1/2 inch of her tail was missing, but not regenerated, but I thought her little stubbed tail was cute. We couldn't wait to acquire a male and prdouce babies from her. Well further down the road we did breed her, and after a really unlucky breeding season with alot of still born and unhatched eggs (incubator problems I suppose) we had one viable hatchling, a beautiful patty named "savannah" (or Tiny as my 5 year old named her). "Savannah" is very pretty and VERY Spunky, but lo and behold his tail is kinked, and rather badly. I chalked it up to bad luck , and figured one of his parents must be responsible, but never put it together until last night. Well after looking at "Spirit" and "Savannah", I realized that the tail kink on "Savannah" matches up to the same spot that "Spirit's" tail is missing. I think I have been hoodwinked! I think it is more than coincidence that "Spirit" has had her tail docked in the same place that her son's is kinked.
Hmmmmmmm.

Has anyone else ever encountered this? I know Pattys are known for the tail kink, and I am curious if anyone has ever seen this done. Needless to say I am not going to breed "Spirit" again, she will be relegated to family pet, as will "Savannah" most likely, but my five year old had already claimed him as her own.

Here is a pic of "savannah"

Thanks for looking

Tony

Outcross Savanah to a non-patty and you will lose the kink... the offspring can be bred back to a patty and you shouldn't see the kink reoccur.

Well I haev a patty male that hacthed from hets with no tail kink, after he was about 8 weeks old his tail started to kink, I called another breeder and the vet, both felt that since the tail was not kinked at birth it was a lack of supplements or the inablity to absorb them.

I then upped his supplements, added more D3, liquid caclium and within 10 days the kinks was gone and still is.

It may be genetic is some cases or a lack of supplements IMHO to the mother/offpsring.

I have been upping the supplements to all of my leos and have noticed an increase in weight gain and overall color and activeness.

I used to only use D3 very sparlingly and now use it alot more often.

Tony, first of all, I think Savannah is a beautiful little patty, kink and all! If her mother has a stub tail, many things might have caused it... it could have been congenital, been bitten off, burned at the end, or became necrotic from bad sheds. It also could have been amputated, but I honestly would think that if that were the case it would have regenerated.

These tail kinks have plagued the patternless morph, as well as some Bell and Tremper albinos with shallow gene pools. I don't think anybody know exactly why this occurs, and there are many educated theories. Heck, kinked tails might not even be a real problem at all... but until we know for sure, my personal feeling is that geckos that have kinked tails (especially patties) should probably not be allowed to breed.

Gene is right about outcrossing. I outcrossed all of my patternless breeders with Ray Hine SHCT's, and haven't seen a single tail kink in my patties for 3 seasons. (knock on wood!)

I agree with all the previous posts. Another thing to take into account is the fact that Savannah hatched abnormally small. I'm not sure what causes some little guys to hatch at such a small size, but I think environmental factors play a big role. In '04 I had a bunch of babies hatch at very small sizes (incubator malfunction), these guys had a much higher incidence of physical defects; I got babies that developed kinked tails from pairs that I'd bred for over four seasons without a single malformation. The large percentage of bad eggs etc, would make me think that there were some environmental factors at play, and if these were potent enough to kill many of the embryos I think that it's highly possible that not all survivors made it unscathed. I agree with not breeding Savannah, but I'd be inclined to give Spirit another try.

-Alice