male/female clutch contributions

[stevek123]

I understand that the size and age of a female can help contribute to the number of eggs in a clutch.

But what about other variables? are they all random? Does a male or female contribute more or less to the color or pattern?

If I have a clutch and I beat the odds big time, am I really just lucky?

What about egg size? and hatchling weight?

If I have all males or all females is there acountability with one of the parents?

And how does temperatures and variations in clutch temperatures interplay?

[Focal]

I don't have all of the answers but I think I have a couple from experience.

From all the research I have gathered, temperature will not affect the gender results of the clutch similar to other reptile species.

I think egg size and hatchling weight depends mostly on the size of the mother and the number of eggs. A smaller mother (i.e. 1200g) that lays more eggs (i.e. 5-6 eggs), will result in smaller eggs and lighter hatchlings, but there are so many other variables that come into play, like the number of slugs, eggs lost, etc.

If you beat the odds big time, I would think you are just lucky. If someone was able to beat the odds intentionally, it would either be a very, very tight secret or everyone would be doing it.

[stevek123]

Thanks Nick.

[Bumble Boy]

In my opinion when start getting too indepth with the sicence part of all this its not fun. Sure its nice to know the basic so u can actually know what your doing but sometimes you gota let things happen and be surprised by your animals that where the real fun is.

[Matt2979]

I completely agree about being lucky to really beat the odds. In my experience, they tend to even themselves out over a few seasons. One example, of many that I could give: Ghost x het Ghost produced .3 ghosts and 1.1 hets (5 eggs) one season and the next season gave me 1.1 Ghosts and 3.2 hets (7 eggs).

This hobby is just as much (if not more) about enjoying the journey to get to the destination...not just the destination, itself.

[CornNut]

Years ago I got the idea that maybe you could select for ball python females that laid more/smaller eggs like other snake species. The total clutch weight stays pretty constant around 1/3 of the pre lay weight so the smaller the eggs are the more of them you get. I didn't track it very long or for very many snakes but it seemed that the size of the eggs for a given female varied from year to year too much to be strongly genetic. Also of course bigger females tend to lay bigger eggs. I wish I knew how to get my 4,200 gram girl to lay twenty 80 gram eggs rather than fourteen 114 gram eggs. The big babies are nice but in captivity I don't have any problems with the smaller babies so would like to have more even if they are smaller.

[CornNut]

With snakes, the gender is determined by the female's genetic contribution. The babies who get her z chromosome are males (zz) and the ones who get her w chromosome are female (zw). I don't know if there is any individual bias like how some human families tend to have sons and others daughters even though the average for all families is closer to 50/50. At one point I asked for clutch gender records from a large breeder who mentioned they keep them with the idea of seeing if the distribution was the normal curve as would be expected if it's completely random or if it's got two humps indicating some females have male offspring bias and some female offspring bias. They wanted to hang on to the data to publish but now breeders like RDR put that data on the web so I should go back and plot the curve.

[R. Eventide]

Some of this I've been looking into, and I'm trying to keep meticulous records on my own snakes/clutches to see if there are any patterns.

I'll try to answer the questions with what I've seen so far....

I understand that the size and age of a female can help contribute to the number of eggs in a clutch.

But what about other variables? are they all random? Does a male or female contribute more or less to the color or pattern?

As for males or females contributing more to color/pattern, I think I'm starting to see a trend--at least, in bearded dragons--where the male offspring tend to look more like the father and female offspring tend to look more like the mother, in terms of color. It can easily go either way, of course; technically, it should be random. I have a friend with a male/female beardie pair where the father is more reddish and has less reddish coloring overall than the female, who is more orange and more brightly colored. Also, the father has a thinner body type than the mother, who tends to be more chubby. Of the handful of offspring I've seen (from two different clutches), the males have less color, are more reddish, and tend to stay thin, unlike the female offspring, who tend to be more colorful, more orange, and more chubby. This is just one pair, though, and it's really subjective. I haven't talked with other beardie breeders to see if they've noticed a similar pattern.

For ball pythons, it'd be even harder to tell which parent might've had more of an influence than the other, especially since overall colors and patterns are difficult to gauge. (I'm not talking about color/pattern morphs; I'm talking about more subtle variations in said color/pattern morphs.)

If I have a clutch and I beat the odds big time, am I really just lucky?

For beating the odds: Yep, you got lucky. It's all statistics. Flip a coin a number of times and you have a specific chance of getting all heads, all tails, or any other specific combination. But the more times you flip the coin, the more the statistics start to even out, and by the time you flip a coin several hundred times, you're going to be pretty close to 50%. As someone else just mentioned, have enough clutches, and the statistics will even out.

What about egg size? and hatchling weight?

I haven't noticed a pattern with egg/hatchling size and female age/weight yet. My friend's het Lav female was small (< 1500 g), and she laid five huge eggs. My clutches, so far, have been from 2000+ g females laying seven- or eight-egg clutches, but the eggs were small compared to the het Lav.

Hatchling weight should directly correlate to egg size simply due to the fact that larger eggs have a larger amount of material to work with. Then again, using the het Lav example from before, the babies were all of similar weights to my small-egg clutch from last year. Their average weight was probably higher, but not by a significant amount. (I should do the numbers with these and see how they turn out.)

Again, though, this is only comparing a few clutches. There is definitely a correlation between number of eggs and size of the female (yeah, I know, kind of a no-brainer, there). I'm currently keeping track of female age, weight, and length to see if there are correlations between those and clutch/hatchling size/weight. I'm sure there is a direct correlation, but I don't know if it's a tight one or if there will be a lot of scatter. My guess is the latter.

If I have all males or all females is there acountability with one of the parents?

Most likely, you just flipped all heads or all tails merely by chance. But someone in another thread just mentioned that F1 (?) Bananas throw single-sex clutches. It's not unheard of for things like that to happen--seems like it's more common in species that can reproduce without mating.

And how does temperatures and variations in clutch temperatures interplay?

This is something that's been discussed quite a bit lately. I know someone is doing their undergrad (or Master's?) research on how incubation temperature affects hatching times, so we'll have a good idea once they've finished their research. I'm working on this, too, but it's going to be a while before I have enough clutches for decent statistics.

As for how incubation temperature and/or fluctuations influence hatchling size or something like that, I don't know. If there is an effect, it's likely insignificant compared to other factors.

In my opinion when start getting too indepth with the sicence part of all this its not fun. Sure its nice to know the basic so u can actually know what your doing but sometimes you gota let things happen and be surprised by your animals that where the real fun is.

For some of us, the in-depth science is part of the fun. That's why I'm a scientist in the first place! ;)

[stevek123]

I agree 100%, it's good to keep it fun and what is more fun than when those eggs start to pip. Someone told me recently that males play a big role in the odds. So if you did get the morph GODS on your side you have your male to thank for it. I haven't been breeding long enough to know. Any one out there have good odds with any particular male that they can think of?

[pythonpaintjobs]

This hobby is just as much (if not more) about enjoying the journey to get to the destination...not just the destination, itself.

I HATE the journey......It drives me NUTS!!!!!!! Take me straight to the destination!:D

[Matt2979]

I agree 100%, it's good to keep it fun and what is more fun than when those eggs start to pip. Someone told me recently that males play a big role in the odds. So if you did get the morph GODS on your side you have your male to thank for it. I haven't been breeding long enough to know. Any one out there have good odds with any particular male that they can think of?

The example that I gave of ghost x het ghost and their offspring, was from the same pairing both years. The only other male that I've paired to the same females (by himself) for a couple of years in a row would have been a mojo breeder, and those odds also varied. But in no way can I say that I did enough with him to prove, nor disprove, any theories about the role that the sire plays in the odds.

I HATE the journey......It drives me NUTS!!!!!!! Take me straight to the destination!:D

Sometimes I say things that I need to hear, myself. As much as I enjoy my animals, don't think that I'm not pacing around my snake room...looking for a lock, looking for an ovy, waiting on eggs, waiting on pips, waiting on first sheds....:rofl: The destination is awesome, but there really is a lot of fun along the way.

And for people like Krystal (scientist), I'm sure the "exacts" are fun for y'all, but they just make my head hurt! :ack2: lol Just show me some purdy colors coming out of my eggs, and I'll be a very happy camper!! :D

[R. Eventide]

LOL! Yeah, I enjoy doing the science of ball python breeding more than my actual job! :D

But I totally agree: the very best feeling in the world is when the first egg of a clutch pips. LOVE that moment!!! So exciting!