the AMAZING (so called) 16X het

[diablohogs]

wes, i just went back and read your edit. apology accepted and thanks for clearing things up.

 

[aliceinwl]

I used to frequently peruse Ron Tremper's designer page back when he updated it regularly. There were lots of morphs that just never seemed to catch on. I think that there was a diamond back pattern, a bandit phase, a four eyed phase etc. He also classified carrot head, red eyes (not the solid red like the raptors) as morphs. There are a ton of others that popped up over the years that I can't recall. I think that this gecko could easily be carrying the traits for 16 different morphs, as he defines them. But, I completely aggree with Kelli, when she said that you will need the right female in order for any of them to be manifested. He could be a good investment if the purchaser already has a high end female from Tremper with a similar pedigree.

If I were to plunk down $500 on a gecko, I'd want to know exactly what traits it could potentially carry. I'd also want to know what kind of female I'd need to breed it to. I'd suspect that Tremper would be more that willing to answer these questions for a serious customer. This may sound harsh, but if you buy without researching, you deserve exactly what you get. I don't think that the ad was deceptive, I just think that it raises a lot of questions.

-Alice

 

[Golden Gate Geckos]

sweet 16?

HEY Marcia, I think I found one of your "boys" here. Seems this one thinks HE is in charge of how people SHOULD do business. LOL

Wes, I can assure you that Chad has already been "pulled through a knothole backwards" (as my Grandmother used to say).

 

[Wilomn]

Ooops. Did I misstep? Was I supposed to START a pissing match here? LOL

Shucks even.

 

[Monte]

Whoa! Monte, I'm surprised at you! Would you prefer, "We are a big mega-breeder that will say or do anything for a sale, you know, whatever it takes to pay for the kids private school tuition and our annual 2 week vacation to a tropical island. And don't ask us how we care for our geckos, we are a big mega-breeder and do not have to answer to a lowly wanna be such as yourself. PS. Shop at PetSmart!"

That doesn't sound very gracious, to a man who let you look over his entire business.

And what's wrong with private school or trips? What are we anti-capitalist now?

Viva la France . . . LOL

I still say that "I'm a small breeder, which gives personal attention to each of my geckos, and gives them cute names like Zoe, Panda and Dolly . . . " makes my eyes glaze over.

Sorry, that's how I feel.

 

[bro paul]

forget all these "season finales" - this is real entertainment!?

 

[Monte]

You can tell a thread is winding down when politics come into play.

Sorry about that ...

The weather was really nice today - it felt like a 16 het day . . .

 

[StinaUIUC]

I just want to comment on something repeatedly mentioned earlier in the thread that there aren't 16 recessive genes in leopard geckos.......ummm....I would find it extremely difficult to believe that there are anywhere near that SMALL of a number of recessive genes in leopard geckos! How would you explain polygenic morphs??... I know I'm picking at wording here...but that kind of thing is just something that rubs me the wrong way.

 

[Herpcam]

imagine the person who bought that animal thinking he could reproduce 16 MORPHS with it. just the BUZZ WORD "MORPHS" is enough to attract somone to that animal. AND SIXTEEN?! WOW!

who cares weather or not it is fairly priced. it was 500 dollars! think of what other animal that person could have bought. furthermore would that animal have sold if it wasnt a 16X het? how well is the high yellow jungle giant market doing anyway?

i would suggest that you dont buy any morphs that arent proven out. some people out there want to call every little detail of thier animal a morph without any proof that it is a inheritable trait.

one of which was sold to me as het for JUNGLE. het for what? jungle? since when is jungle a single locus trait??

so its not like i havnt been affected by ron trempers habit of calling anything he wants a morph.

This is not the entire post, just the parts I'd like to discuss.

Got a few questions --

1. What is a morph?

2. What is a trait?

3. What is the difference between the two?

4. Is Carrot Tail a morph, or a trait?

5. Is Carrot Head a morph or a trait?

6. Is Patternless a morph or a trait?

High Yellow? Tangerine? Hypo? Super Hypo? Stripe? Jungle? Line Bred Snow? Mack Snow? Pastel? Rainbow? Tremper Albino? Rainwater Albino? Bell Albino? Leshock Albino (if it was a separate gene)? Circle Back? Jungle? Ghost? Blizzard? Red Stripe? Giant?

I think that's more than 16....but wait, you'll say "But those aren't single locus recessive mutations.....(I am a genetics dummy, so don't criticize for my incorrect usage, please).....


NOONE EVER SAID IT WAS A 16 Times HET for ANYTHING!!!!!

And as for monitoring other people's spending, I often wonder how many other cars or houses people could have bought every time I see a Ferrari or a Lamborghini pass me on the street here. It's none of my business, so I don't talk trash about the car companies. After all, they just say they're better cars.

 

[Blazin]

Reinvention!!!!

First of all I agree with Chad on this one! Hey wait a minute I am Chad! LOL! Wow that reads strange. Anyway I usually don't butt in on this sort of thing, but this time I felt compelled. Like many other accomplished leopard gecko breeders Ron has done some absolutely awesome things with leopard geckos. Let me re-phrase that! Ron has brought to "LIGHT" some really awesome stuff involving leopard geckos. He didn't create anything that wasn't already there he just sort of came across it if you will. Which is very cool! Heck if any of us accomplishes the same we can quite possibly name the new trait after ourselves as well! This whole thing has to bring to mind the word REINVENTION! Reminds me of Artists and Actors in the entertainment field really. Thats all Ron has done with this latest ploy. I don't personally know the guy and have never met him. I'm not questioning his motives because they are clear! To make money! I think a certain disassociation takes place with those of us who truly love the animals we are working with and those who are trying to run a successful business. The leopard gecko has to be one of the toughest markets around! If you have thousands of animals and OBVIOUSLY tremendous overhead its going to call for desperate actions in the minds of some. Unfortunately rather than rest on their laurels some feel the necessity to compromise their common sense and morals in order to stay competative. Actually in most likelyhood this is probably a gross mistatment with regards to RT. With a man like this a $500 dollar leopard gecko is a drop in the bucket! I'd be willing to bet his income comes from VOLUME! Not individual sales of FRU FRU'S! Did I use that term right? LOL! We all need to just take Ron for what he is. A marketer! A MASTER marketer! Axe body spray WILL NOT make you into a studd muffin! A Chrysler 300 will not make you the talk of the town. IPODS are actually a very basic MP3 player. McDonalds new Fruit salads don't make MickeyDees a healthy place to eat! Harley Davidsons,OCC,and West Coast Choppers don't make you into a rebel! Your not intellectual because you watch the Discovery Channel,TLC and the History Channel! Just my two cents!

Whoa! Monte, I'm surprised at you! Would you prefer, "We are a big mega-breeder that will say or do anything for a sale, you know, whatever it takes to pay for the kids private school tuition and our annual 2 week vacation to a tropical island. And don't ask us how we care for our geckos, we are a big mega-breeder and do not have to answer to a lowly wanna be such as yourself. PS. Shop at PetSmart!"

She took the words right of my mouth! Words that I had no clue I wanted to say!

 

[Gregg M]

Axe body spray WILL NOT make you into a studd muffin!

How do you explain all the chicks knocking down my door???? Oh wait, it must be my ravishing good looks.....LOL

 

[Monte]

OK Chad and Kelli, you convinced me. Enough of those really good looking geckos that RT produces. I want a gecko that is hand held, who's name is Cody.

hehe

 

[diablohogs]

How do you explain all the chicks knocking down my door????

they want your holdbacks!!!

 

[reptilebreeder]

This is not the entire post, just the parts I'd like to discuss.

Got a few questions --

1. What is a morph?

2. What is a trait?

3. What is the difference between the two?

4. Is Carrot Tail a morph, or a trait?

5. Is Carrot Head a morph or a trait?

6. Is Patternless a morph or a trait?

High Yellow? Tangerine? Hypo? Super Hypo? Stripe? Jungle? Line Bred Snow? Mack Snow? Pastel? Rainbow? Tremper Albino? Rainwater Albino? Bell Albino? Leshock Albino (if it was a separate gene)? Circle Back? Jungle? Ghost? Blizzard? Red Stripe? Giant?

I think that's more than 16....but wait, you'll say "But those aren't single locus recessive mutations.....(I am a genetics dummy, so don't criticize for my incorrect usage, please).....


NOONE EVER SAID IT WAS A 16 Times HET for ANYTHING!!!!!

And as for monitoring other people's spending, I often wonder how many other cars or houses people could have bought every time I see a Ferrari or a Lamborghini pass me on the street here. It's none of my business, so I don't talk trash about the car companies. After all, they just say they're better cars.

I agree with this post. Well stated.

 

[diablohogs]

1. What is a morph? a mutation.

2. What is a trait? a charecteristic.

3. What is the difference between the two? a mutation is when a gene mutates from the normal funtion it was designed for while a trait is merely a specific charecteristic.

4. Is Carrot Tail a morph, or a trait? trait.

5. Is Carrot Head a morph or a trait? trait.

6. Is Patternless a morph or a trait? morph.

High Yellow? hyperxanthic is rumored to be linked to a single cell mutation. im not sure though.

Tangerine? a linebred trait where the resulting animal is hypexanthic and hypererythristic in appearance.

Hypo? ray hines hypos: morph (dominant/codominant/incomplete dominant), linebred hypos: linebred trait

Super Hypo? (see hypo)

Stripe? ive heard that people have recessive stripes and reverse stripes and i believe they were aquired from ron trempers stock. the lines i work with are polygenic selectively bred traits. i believe, from the result of breeding abberant offspring.

Jungle? abberent patterned. polygenic trait.

Line Bred Snow? selectively bred to appear anerythristic and axanthic.

Mack Snow? incomplete dominant morph. single locus mutation.

Pastel? im guessing possibly dominant. not sure on this one but im working on understanding it better.

Rainbow? pastel and stripe i believe.

Tremper Albino? single locus mutation. recessive morph.

Rainwater Albino? single locus mutation. recessive morph.

Bell Albino? single locus mutation. recessive morph.

Leshock Albino (if it was a separate gene)? i thought this was proven to be trempers line. single locus mutation. recessive morph.

Circle Back? abberent patterned. polygenic.

Jungle? you already said jungle.

Ghost? dominant or codominant/incomplete dominant.

Blizzard? single locus mutation. recessive morph.

Red Stripe? good question. im gonna say linebred.

Giant? first it was recessive, then it was codominant. cant say for sure but it definately isnt recessive.

 

[KelliH]

Ok Monte,

That doesn't sound very gracious, to a man who let you look over his entire business.

What's not gracious about that? The truth isn't gracious enough for you? You stated it made you want to puke when you see a statement on someone's website about them being a smaller breeder and therefore can give theri animals individual attention, better care etc. So I simply stated the opposite end of the spectrum, which I would gather by your statement would make you feed good, rather than feeling sick.

And what's wrong with private school or trips? What are we anti-capitalist now?

Nothing wrong with those things at all, again, I was stating the opposite end of the spectrum. I didn't say if it was good or bad.

I still say that "I'm a small breeder, which gives personal attention to each of my geckos, and gives them cute names like Zoe, Panda and Dolly . . . " makes my eyes glaze over.

Well I am real sorry you feel that way. I happen to give names to most of my breeder leos, and holy crap, I give them personal attention too. I know, it sickens you doesn't it. But the big mega breeders that crank out leos and ship them out in wholesale lots the day they hatch make you feel good? How do you rationalize that? I am sorry, I do not understand.

OK Chad and Kelli, you convinced me. Enough of those really good looking geckos that RT produces. I want a gecko that is hand held, who's name is Cody.

Yeah, like you never name your geckos Monte haha. I know you better than that!

 

[diablohogs]

After all, they just say they're better cars.

better than what? what are you comparing a lamboghini and a ferrarri to?

 

[Herpcam]

1. What is a morph? a mutation.

2. What is a trait? a charecteristic.

3. What is the difference between the two? a mutation is when a gene mutates from the normal funtion it was designed for while a trait is merely a specific charecteristic.

4. Is Carrot Tail a morph, or a trait? trait.

5. Is Carrot Head a morph or a trait? trait.

6. Is Patternless a morph or a trait? morph.

High Yellow? hyperxanthic is rumored to be linked to a single cell mutation. im not sure though.

Tangerine? a linebred trait where the resulting animal is hypexanthic and hypererythristic in appearance.

Hypo? ray hines hypos: morph (dominant/codominant/incomplete dominant), linebred hypos: linebred trait

Super Hypo? (see hypo)

Stripe? ive heard that people have recessive stripes and reverse stripes and i believe they were aquired from ron trempers stock. the lines i work with are polygenic selectively bred traits. i believe, from the result of breeding abberant offspring.

Jungle? abberent patterned. polygenic trait.

Line Bred Snow? selectively bred to appear anerythristic and axanthic.

Mack Snow? incomplete dominant morph. single locus mutation.

Pastel? im guessing possibly dominant. not sure on this one but im working on understanding it better.

Rainbow? pastel and stripe i believe.

Tremper Albino? single locus mutation. recessive morph.

Rainwater Albino? single locus mutation. recessive morph.

Bell Albino? single locus mutation. recessive morph.

Leshock Albino (if it was a separate gene)? i thought this was proven to be trempers line. single locus mutation. recessive morph.

Circle Back? abberent patterned. polygenic.

Jungle? you already said jungle.

Ghost? dominant or codominant/incomplete dominant.

Blizzard? single locus mutation. recessive morph.

Red Stripe? good question. im gonna say linebred.

Giant? first it was recessive, then it was codominant. cant say for sure but it definately isnt recessive.

That's good, Chad. I appreciate the time you put into this. I know I probably wouldn't have gone through the trouble.

Morph - morph2 Audio pronunciation of "morph" ( P ) Pronunciation Key (môrf)
n.
One of various distinct forms of an organism or species.
[From Greek morph, form, shape.]

Dictionary.com Definition of Morph

Is your definition, morph=mutation, the same as everyone's definition? Is that RT's definition of morph, vs. trait?

How about Gekkonida.com's leopard gecko MORPH page

And Steve Syke's Leopard Gecko Genetics page. Apparently he disagrees with your definition for some of the 'morphs' as well.

See, what you call a trait, is possibly what RT (and others apparently), call a morph, and vice versa.

who cares weather or not it is fairly priced. it was 500 dollars! think of what other animal that person could have bought. furthermore would that animal have sold if it wasnt a 16X het? how well is the high yellow jungle giant market doing anyway?

This what I was referring to in the car reference. That someone would spend 100K+ for a car when they could buy a house in some places in our country or a couple other cars. The manufacturer's believe the lamborghini's and ferrari's are better cars (as some people do). Ie. Ferrari vs. Ford and 16-morph-gene-carrying-gecko vs. whatever Chad deems better. Who puts the value on the gecko, and who are you to challenge that? I will admit, I used to really care what people sold their geckos for, but I got over it. I hate to see someone get ripped off, but it happens, life goes on. I know that this 16 gene-carrying gecko wasn't as much of a rip off as I've seen before. (please don't get me wrong, if I were worth millions, I'd probably check out a ferrari, also, but to some people, that's insane).

i would suggest that you dont buy any morphs that arent proven out. some people out there want to call every little detail of thier animal a morph without any proof that it is a inheritable trait.

So, to be a morph, it has to be inheritable? Why then isn't a Carrottail a morph? Or a jungle? Jungle's are related to Stripes, and I'll go out on a limb and say that they're quite genetic...perhaps not simple recessive, but it's in their genes. RT does believe his jungles are recessive mutations. Have you had these traits/morphs/mutations tested to confirm they're controlled by a single locus? (once again, I'm a genetic idjit, don't beat me up for my choice of words). You admit yourself that you're not positive on some of them.

The fact remains, he never sait it was a 16x het for anything, just a multi-het that carries genes for 16 morphs, which we've established above means different things to different people.

Chad, and everyone else - I don't think he's a god, and I don't agree with everything he does (especially not his incubation methods), but let's stop singling people out and trying to nuke them for such a simple little thing. He's not selling a leopard gecko skeleton that's 20g 'Ready to Breed', and he's not selling a Super Hypo Tangerine Carrot Tail Baldy that looks like a 5 gram normal...let this one go. I still can't wait to hear his explanation of the 16 morphs.

 

[Gekkonida]

IMO Chad is pretty darn close to spot on here. We don't know all of the genetics behind the morphs but we are all trying to figure them out. This to me is another reason it is kinda of silly to talk about these traits in such a mattar of fact manner as to the whole make 16 morphs from one gecko.

OK, so where do the new variants "mutations" come from - They come from not new combinations of alleles, but new alleles themselves. Here is an easy way to understand it. Take a tangerine. It has multiple alleles that interact to give it its tangerine color. When you breed the animal together with another animal with the same strong color traits you get stronger color traits in the offspring. That isn't a mutation, rather just strong traits. That is why it is considered line bred.

We are now entering a whole different ball game in genetics. But what the heck lets go there! Probably the most common kind of mutations are those in which a single nucleotide base gets copied incorrectly or a big fat mistake in the DNA, this is called a point mutation. An example of how a point mutation works, without boring everyone, can result from changing one base out of the three in a codon resulting in a codon that calls for a different amino acid type at that point in the sequence. This is bad for the most part and is a catalyst to some nasty genetic diseases. This has a drastic effect and can cause the DNA to mutate. Now we have changed the DNA or created a mutation.

There are many possibilities when it comes to how and what make up a trait. Discrete variants for example are either or type characteristics, on or off; they have only two possibilities. To give an example[MADE UP] "If" head spots and baldy were discrete variants an offspring would either have head spots or be baldy.

Continuous variation- describes traits that have a range of variation, rather than distinct types, like tail length, skull size and skull shape. There are a lot more than these here, but we will pass on exploring this further for now.

- Dichotomous traits are controlled by just one pair of alleles.
- Continuously varying traits are controlled by many pairs of alleles.
- Traits that are controlled by multiple pairs of alleles (multiple loci) are called polygenic traits ie. traits not mutations. This is important to know.

And now for some really fun stuff pleiotropic alleles! They are really never talked about much in genetics in general let alone reptile genetic discussions, but they are important as well. It is when alleles effect more than one trait.

So coming back full circle the distinction between traits and mutations can be made fairly easily assuming we have a good study group to work with. I hope this helped a little.?

 

[Gregg M]

Rob, this is directly off of his site.....

#623 MULTI-HET JUNGLE PHASE SUPER GIANT - Male - 116 grams - $500.US
12 months old
Carries the genes for 16 different leopard gecko morphs!
Still growing!

That is a misleading play of words at best..... Some of us know that it is not het for 16 morphs, but I am sure the buyer thinks they will produce 16 different morphs with this animal.....

Honestly, do you see a SHTCTB comming from this leo??? Or a Mack super snow, or how about a temper, bell, or las vagas hybino??? Aint happenin..... Oh wait, I know, there is a chance that a blazing blizzard will pop out when this is paired tonother leo, right???

The difference between your car theory and this leopard gecko is that when someone buys a Ferrari they know exactly what they are getting inside and out and if it is not what was advertised, it can be proven...... The person buying a car like that would have to know something about cars or atleast that particular model and will have quite a bit of money to spend.....

When it comes to this Leopard Gecko, It unfortunatly can not be proven either way and RT knows this..... Most likely the person buying it does not know much otherwise the person would have laughed at the claim and the price..... Also $500 is a good amount of money but it is nothing a 15 year old could not save up in a month.....

I would love to see the responses someone like me or Chad would get if we made the same claims as RT.....LOL...... My guess is that most of the people defending RT would be the same people ripping us a new A-hole...... Not to mention if we knowingly cause deaths and deformities so we can produce brighter looking babies by increasing incubation temps at critical stages of the embryos development.....