Gecko Genetics

okay i feel its time we put our heads together and iron out the wrinkles of the genetics of leopard geckos. we really need to lay it down so there isn't any more confusion.

Tremper/Bell/Rainwater Albino- recessive gene

Ray Hine Hypo- dominant?

Carrot Tail- line bred?

Tangerine- recessive?

Baldy- line bred through hypo?? probably recessive.

Super Hypo- result of crossing dominant hypos with each other. line bred?

Blizzard- recessive

Patternless- recessive

Jungle/Stripe/Reverse stripe/Abberant- recessive. variations of one another.

Snow- line bred?

Giant- recessive

if there are more that you guys can come up with feel free to add them. i added question marks behind the ones i wasn't 100% on. i feel that there is way too much confusion about whats what and how these different traits are inherited.

Pastel Hypo- recessive

and ill leave out eye color... although it is my opinion that brown would be dominant and all other colors would be recessive if not co-dominant.

there are also inherited defects...
Patternless sometimes carry a genetic defect for a kink in the end of the tail.
Eyelid defects appear to be genetic as well and also quite often seen in patternless.

it would be nice to have these listed as well, i feel.

Originally posted by diablohogs
Pastel Hypo- recessive

I don't want you throwing this one out just for me. Pastel is line bred into the hypo bloodlines the same way as Tangerine Hypos are created.

i emailed K&N regarding the Dominant hypo and what that meant and the answer answered alot of the questions i had about other traits within the hypo line.

apparently hypos and super hypos come from the same line (along with all forms of hypomelanism in leopard geckos) and they all come from a wild caught hypo from Ray Hine. this original hypo was line bred to reduce spotting over many generations and the carrot tail is also a linebred trait. if you cross two dominant hypos you will get a much cleaner dominant hypo than if you breed one to a normal. this is a super hypo and typically has no spotting.

so is tangerine a recessive or line bred trait? ive been told it is in fact a recessive trait but maybe that person didnt have a golden baldy hypo with a carrot elbow (i should throw a picture of this up, one of my hypos has actually developed a solid orange spot on her elbow. i truely believe that the carrot coloration can eventually be line bred to cover the whole gecko, but im just guessing.

i'm digressing a little bit here. where was i... oh yeah so the only questions left are what are the following traits:

SNOW
TANGERINE

line bred or genetic? can you make snows/tangerines from normals? just line breed the crap out of em? or do you first need the gene that reduces other pigment than black,yellow and white in snows and the gene that produces orange pigment in tangerines.

As for inheritied defects, we do not know enough about them to say for certain that they are in fact gentic. While kinked tails seem to be genetic, there needs to be further research before anyone can comment on it. As for eye defects, I am almost certain this is due to incubation temp problems, but again, further research is needed. As for Tangerine and Snow, both are line bred.

what about those pug face looking leos, would that be a defect or what? i think alot of these defects in leos comes from inbreeding. i meen when all these phases started up it was there werent to many blood lines where there, i meen when tremper got some albinos, how many did he start with, there has to be some interbreeding in these cases.

Chad, since you have have always been a snake guy and only been involved with Leopard Geckos for a very short time, I think you are thinking along the lines of snake morph genetics. Although the same rules may very well apply, we are only just beginning to understand how it works with leos. Heck, we aren't even sure yet about the taxonimy of all of the various 'strains', 'species', and/or 'sub-species' of Leopard Geckos that are found all over SW Asia!

While kinked tails seem to be genetic, there needs to be further research before anyone can comment on it. As for eye defects, I am almost certain this is due to incubation temp problems, but again, further research is needed.

Justyn, I agree with you on this 100%.