Question about filial generations...

I've been meaning to ask this question for a while, and figured I'd get a little traffic into this forum while simultaneously getting an education

I'm confused about how to label offspring if the filial generations are not the same. For example, if I were to breed an F9 to an F4, what would the resulting babies be? Would they be F10's or F5's or something completely different?

Also, is there any difference in the answer if you breed an F3 to a WC animal (obviously of the Pth generation).

Thanks for any insight you can offer!
JB

The filial number denotes the number of generations the animal is removed from its wild ancestors.

When determining the filial number for offspring with parents having different numbers, you only consider the parent that is closest to it's wild ancestors, in other words, the parent with the lowest filial number.

For example:
F6 x F3 = F2
F3 x F4 = F4
F5 x WC = F1

Since you want the number of generations removed from the wild, you will of course find wild ancestors sooner in the family tree from the parent with the lower filial number. Regardless of how high the other parent's number is, this is still where the bloodline of the offspring meets the wild ancestors, so this is the number of generations it is removed from them.

Clay,

I was confused a little bit on your numbering.

"For example:
F6 x F3 = F2"

Your other numbers made since, but this one didn't. If you were breeding an F6 to an F3, wouldn't the resulting offspring be F4 instead of F2?

You are absolutely right Rob, I even read over the post and didn't catch my error before hitting submit.

Glad you were paying closer attention than I was.
The consise version though is to take the parent with the lowest filial number and add one to it for the offspring.

Thanks for the correction, don't want to confuse anyone.

I don´t understand

What is all the F6 X F3 = F4 ????

F6, F3, etc are filial numbers. These are a means of tracking generations.
In this case F3 would denote the 3rd generation of offspring decended from the wild caught founding parents.
An F1 animal would have either one or both parents being wild caught. The offspring of two of those siblings would be F2 because they are the second generation from the wild caught parents.
The number following the F tells you how far back you can go to find wild caught parent(s) in the snakes history.

I believe the rest of the details of calculating the filial number were adequately described above.

Ok, now I understand.. Thanks!!

(of course there was going to be a but ) can't there be a more simple way to put these numbers in check? I'd feel bad about outcrossing an F6 with an f1 and calling the offspring F2. It would seem division would be in order to come up with an appropriate filial number in this case. Or at LEAST an asterik (Oh, I hate that I can't edit spelling!) to explain the result. But glad to have this cleared up, even if I don't "like" the answer!

But if you bred an F1 and an F6, the appropriate number for the offspring would be F2. This is the reason for filial numbers, to determine how far back you go into an animals bloodline to find the founder stock, in this case the original WC animals.
If you instead split the difference between the numbers, the resulting number for the offspring would have no meaning, since it would not denote anything. It would be bypassing the purpose of the filial number to begin with.

I'm a little confused. I was under the impression that P, F1, F2... and so on were references for relatedness and had nothing to do with generations removed from the wild. I thought the filial generations were ways to demonstrate genetic connections between related animals. For example, the "P" (parent) generation breeds together to produce the F1 generation. The F1 (siblings) breed together to produce F2s. Each successive generation is selfed or bred together to produce the next filial generation. Breeding the F1 babies from two unrelated pairs of animals would therefore produce F1s because there is no genetic connection between the offspring of parent pair "A" and "B". The F1 offspring would in essence become a new P generation. Can anyone comment on this? I think the generational indicator may be a misapplication of the original definition.