Inbreeding = weaker species?

There is an article in the August issue of Reptiles Magazine that discusses herp morphs. Bert Langerwerf from Agama International brought up that he doesn't like color morphs because "In general, it is achieved by inbreeding, and gradually this will create weaker animals."

Well, that sounds pretty logical to me.

Does anyone worry about this in leos? What are the possible detrimental effects of inbreeding, and what effects are we already seeing?

Well I'm not really very experienced with leos...but from what I've seen one large effect of inbreeding is kinked tails. The problem with inbreeding (and to a lesser extent line-breeding) is that it brings out hidden recessive traits...which can be good...that's how we perpetuate morphs...however it brings out detrimental traits as well...in dogs hip dysplasia is a result of inbreeding and linebreeding, and now ther is no way to get rid of it in the breeds that have it (it can be reduced...but never fully eradicated). Since the detrimental genes can be hidden though, its impossible to predict what might pop up to cause problems.

there is too much inbreeding done. I understand people want the "new morph" whatever it may be, but the downside is the problems we are starting to see now...babies born with missing parts and other malformations. I also think people are buying geckos and just breeding them because they think there is a lot of money to be made. They are buying several geckos from the same breeder or petstore & breeding them without realizing that the geckos may be closely related. It still pisses me off when I read a post from someone who has a sick gecko or is asking very general questions (they should already know) about the care of geckos & then mentioning that they are going to breed the geckos. If you don't know their general care requirements, then you really have no business breeding them! Man, I always get fired up about this subject.

Man, I always get fired up about this subject.

Q's are good.
I believe people have good intentions when it comes to keeping and breeding anything.
Now there are "some" people out there who don't give a flying flip about the health of their animals, and the bottom line is the $$.
I think that if a person wants to breed Leos, he/she should understand the basics of general care, not breeding as of yet.
Breeding knowledge can and will come later. It's ok if the person doesn't know what the incubation temps are, or the weights of animals before breeding, that can come with questions from the people who have been there and done that.
I bought 4 Leos with very little knowledge above their general care req's, and am breeding them as we speak. I just made sure to ask alot of q's.
Do I want to make some money while I'm having fun? Heck yeah!
There's nothing better than making $$ doing something you really like to do.

There isn't much that suprises me anymore when I hear of the horror stories and see pictures of sick animals. To me that is just a pure lack of knowledge and not asking questions before they got into a certain species.

i've noticed actually it seems like the people that buy and sell are the ones that normally have neglected animals because neglected breeders wont breed normally.

True. The more stressed the animal, the less likely it is to breeding.

I am one breeder who does NOT line-breed because I feel that I have a professional and ethical obligation to ensure the quality and genetic strength of the species. I selectively out-cross by taking into consideration the combined physical attributes and genetic lines of my adults in order to produce beautiful, healthy offspring. This does not mean I am passing judgement on those that do line-breed, nor does it mean I don't appreciate the work that goes in to developing new morphs.

I feel that kinked tails in patternless, aggressive dispositions in blizzards, and many other genetic faults are a result of irresponsible inbreeding. Will I ever develop a new morph? Nope. Will I ever become rich and famous? Nope. Do I have lovely, healthy leopard geckos? Yup!

i've noticed actually it seems like the people that buy and sell are the ones that normally have neglected animals because neglected breeders wont breed normally.

wtf? are you trying to say that people who sell thier geckos only sell the ones that are neglected or in poor mental/phisical health??

thats ridiculous. if i sell an adult its because i know that it has produced an animal that would make a nicer breeder and that gecko (males typically) no longer has room in my collection.

im limited on space. if it were up to me i would keep every gecko i have.

to make the assumption that the only reason someone would sell one of thier animals is because there is something wrong with it is completely ridiculous.

If I'm trying to breed for a trait, I want to have at least 3 groups of the same project, and then you can breed between the groups and avoid inbreeding. Obviously it happens after a couple of generations of using the same few lines, but every few years I switch who I'm breeding and always try to bring in new blood. I've never had a problem with kinked tails or missing limbs using this method. I've also never tried to start my own morph that is unpurchasable (I don't think that's a word, lol), so I understand my inbreeding can be useful. If I had to, I would bring in new blood and create some hets and try to get those to breed. It'll take a while but seems like it would keep the genetics stronger. I'm fairly new to actually breeding for sale, but this is my policy after seeing what can happen. Just my two cents.

how do you "start a new morph"?

other than going to pakistan to gather wild caught specimens and hopefully popping out with something new from that its impossible, or at least so unlikely that it seems impossible. hense the high price of a new morph. you cant just inbreed the hell out of something and than *blam* new morph! thats nieve.

missing feet and kinked tails arent necessarily the result of coupling recessive genes? what freakin gene makes only 3 feet? can you breed that into other lines? a three footed giant carrot tail?

as far as kinked tails...who knows...could be genetic but it could also be the result incubation temperature fluctuations.

p.s. Ron Tremper has been linebreeding his gecks for what, 20 or 30 years? i have two giant carrot heads from him and both are very docile, do not have kinks in their tails and have all four feet.